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Alicia Calixte

Dr.Green

ENGW 104-17 Writing, Literacy, and Discourse

24 October 2016

I never thought I would sign up to beassaulted as a career path. That was something that I

never realized that happened so frequently and that it was almost okay for nurses to be beat up all

the time or verbally or physically assaulted and I guess thats normal practice and its going to

take a lot longer to change that.

- RN05 ( an anonymous nurse apart of the 2013 Stevenson study)

Violence and Silence: A Nurses Crisis

These are the words of a psychiatric nurse who was apart of a study on the experiences

of violence against nurses. The 2013 study was done for 9 months in Canada, working with

nurses from the mental health department. The study was used to question how nurses

experienced abuse from patients and to have them describe their experiences with patient

violences. The results were that nurses described being chased and cornered, being hit, punched

or grabbed, kicked, spit at, strangled, as well as using a weapon or the environment, such as

breaking a window, to elicit violence. (Stevenson et al, 2015). Unfortunately, many nurses have

still yet to speak on the verbal abuse, physical violence and even fatal events that can happen

while on the job. They have found that many nurses believed the abuse was just apart of the

job. Because of this idea, many of these incidents often go unreported. This sadly leads to an

ongoing cycle of nurses experiencing patient abuse, facing negative effects from patient abuse,

and refusing to take real action towards these assaults. This vicious cycle of abuse will also
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continue to remain ignored and hidden in the health world unless laws are passed to protect

nurses and nurses actually start to report assaults.

Nursing is a highly promoted form of employment. The Bureau of Labor Statistics

reports that nursing has a high job growth rate of 16% making it one of the fastest growing jobs

around. It is the largest healthcare profession and makes up majority of hospital employment. A

lot of nurses like my mother, are very happy with their professions. They love to see their

patients improve from critical conditions and make a difference through caring for their patients.

I, a current freshman biology major, will be switching to nursing. I have decided to switch into

the major because I, like my mother, want to make a difference in peoples health. At the end of

my career, I want to be able to say that I have actually made a positive difference in peoples

health and well-being. I feel that nursing will help me get to that goal because nurses not only

care for patients but are also advocates for their health. Nurses are the connection between the

patient and the hospital. Because nurses are the main hospital worker the patient interacts with,

they can help advocate what is best for the patient to recover. It is very clear that they contribute

a lot to the hospitals they work for through the care of their patients. However, many have to face

physical and verbal abuse while on the job. It is important that we increase awareness, make

laws, and enforce a safe environment so that nurses can be able to do their jobs without being in

fear of going to work everyday.

Nurses have to adjust to the dangerously high risk of getting verbally and physically

attacked at work. Studies have found that 67% of nurses , 63% of PCAs, 51% of physicians have

been attacked at least once within 6 months by patients (Gates et al, 60). A lot of these attacks

included both verbal abuse and physical abuse together. Sadly, this means that almost every

nurse who goes into their profession will face patient assault. It is an issue that there is such a
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high percentage for nurses hurt. In an interview with my mother, a registered nurse who works at

the hospital of Brigham and Womens in Boston, Massachusetts, I questioned patient violence at

the hospital and if it is only the patients that attack, Of course, there is both violence from the

patient and their family. Families can be very unruly. It becomes more prevalent with nursing

because they are more at risk. The nurses spend the most time with patients so they are more

prone to getting hit, (Joseph, 1). Despite that this is a very common issue, it is most likely that

many nursing majors like myself are not fully aware of the issue. I was ver surprised by the

degree of violence that occurred. Because nurses have frequent contact with patients and are

often the connection between the patient and the health professional, it is important to fix the

issue of patient assault. If left unbothered, nurses will continue to work in fear and face negative

effects of the abuse.

After facing such traumatic experiences, it is very common for nurses to feel nervous and

even fear coming to work. While the death rate is low among health workers, the assault rate is

extremely high. Nurses can face usual effects of physical wounds such as fractures, concussions,

bruises and more.Unfortunately, not many nurses tend to acknowledge this issue. For example,

the magazine Cosmopolitan interviewed a registered nurse from a hospital in Washington D.C.

In this interview she talks about things she wished she knew before becoming a nurse. The

biggest problem she stated was how as a nurse Your body will age quickly. Standing and

walking for 12-plus hours, holding your bladder, lifting patients who weigh more than 250

pounds: these are just a few of the physical feats youll do each day (R.N. 2015). It seems that

despite how frequent and serious this issue of assault is nobody ever decides to address it. With

this platform, this nurse should have made this issue known so that she could raise awareness

like NPR does. On their website, an article discusses the study done by the American Journal of
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Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. They found that, 24 percent of ICU nurses and 14

percent of general nurses tested positive for symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.(Yu,

2015). NPR is a very popular radio station so, to display such a serious issue on a big platform

will get people to understand that this is not something to look over. It will be especially

important for nursing majors like myself to be not only aware of this issue but, to also know how

to report it and make this issue known. Nurses should not fear the very place meant to help and

cure people. Just because assault is frequent in the workplace does not mean that it should be

ignored or dismissed. Laws must be put in place to protect nurses in their environment and they

must actually be enforced.

As of right now in the US, only 32 states have penalties for the assault of nurses.

However, it seems that to the US, nurses safety is not a real importance as not every single state

has laws protecting them. Once again nurses make up majority of the hospital, with assault so

frequent it is not okay that not every nurse in the US has laws protecting them. It reinforces the

mentality that it just apart of the job and that they are supposed to just deal with it and the risks

of psychological problems. These are the same people that care for friends, family, and more.

There should most definitely be a respect of security for these people that care for loved ones.

It takes a tremendous effort to become and work as a nurse. They are bridge between the

patient and the other hospital professionals. Therefore, they should feel secure in their work

environment and be able to do their job efficiently. Patient assault is inevitable for anyone who

wants to work anywhere in the medical world. However, there must be a protection set aside for

these workers because they should not have to fear an environment meant to help not harm. I

believed that I had knowledge based on the experiences that I have heard from my mother who

faces this issue every day. Still, I only had knowledge to a certain extent. I never knew of how
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serious of an issue patient assault was and the lack of protection nurses had for it. It has made me

truly understand the dangers of working as a nurse. Nursing can be a great career for those

willing to put in the effort and understand the precaution. However, if they do come across an

assault. It is also important to know that these assault must be reported and that nurses should

seek help if they suffer negative symptoms after these assaults. Nursing can be a very difficult

career to have, so it very important to know what you are getting yourself into because there is

no turning back. Switching to nursing is a very serious choice I made. While this will not be the

job that I will have for my entire career, it is important to realize that attacks and other obstacles

are completely inevitable. I will need to understand my rights and protection as a nurse so that I

can be able to fulfill my job as a nurse with knowledge of what to do when I come across these

issues.
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Bibliography

"14 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Became a Nurse." Cosmopolitan. Hearst, 10 Oct.

2016. Web. 28 Oct. 2016.

Gates, Donna M., RN, Gordon L. Gillespie, DR, and Paul Succop, DR. "Violence Against

Nurses and it Impact on Stress and Productivity." Medscape. N.p., 2011. Web. 23 Oct. 2016.

Richter, Dirk, and Klaus Berger. "Post-traumatic Stress Disorder following Patient

Assaults among Staff Members of Mental Health Hospitals: A Prospective Longitudinal Study."

BMC Psychiatry. Richter and Berger, 10 Apr. 2006. Web. 23 Oct. 2016.

Stevenson, Kelly N., Susan M. Jack, Linda O'Mara, and Jeannette LeGris. "Registered

Nurses' Experiences of Patient Violence on Acute Care Psychiatric Inpatient Units: An

Interpretive Descriptive Study." BMC Nursing. N.p., 17 May 2015. Web. 23 Oct. 2016.

"Workplace Violence." Workplace Violence. The American Nurses Association, Inc, May

2016. Web. 23 Oct. 2016.

Yu, Alan. "Nurses Say Stress Interferes With Caring For Their Patients." NPR. NPR,

2015. Web. 28 Oct. 2016.