Prevalence of Violence towards Staff Nurses and their Knowledge and Utilization of Safety Resources

Professions within the healthcare industry are becoming increasingly violent places in which to work with healthcare professionals being common targets for violent and aggressive behaviour. Aggression and violence negatively impact both workplace and its employees. For the organization, greater financial costs can be incurred due to increased absences, early retirement and reduced quality of care and it is mainly due to violence. For the healthcare worker however, psychological damage, such as post-traumatic stress, can result in addition to a decrease in job motivation.

The present study was conducted to assess the prevalence of violence by patients and their relatives towards staff nurses and to identify knowledge and utilization of safety resources among 100 staff nurses in Guru Nanak Dev Hospital of Amritsar (Punjab) with convenient sampling technique. All the staff nurses experienced assault during their duty hours mostly in the morning shift mainly in the wards. Most of them had average/poor knowledge about safety resources and unfavourable utilization of safety resources.

In conclusion, nurses are facing violence by patients and their relatives and hence they need to enhance knowledge and use of safety resources towards violence to combat violence.