Workplace violence is taking a toll on healthcare workers. It’s the reason some are leaving the profession, while others are changing disciplines and workplace settings in search of a safer alternative.
In our exclusive investigation, Code Blue, 11 Investigates uncovered attacks on healthcare workers, heard from hundreds of workers about their experiences with violence and talked to lawmakers who are being urged to do more to harden medical facilities and protect employees.
Now, a first-of-its-kind statewide survey is revealing how frequently attacks are happening to healthcare workers and how the problem is impacting the workplace.
The problem doesn’t only put healthcare workers at risk, either. Patients are also vulnerable. 11 Investigates has uncovered multiple violent incidents where patients intervened, coming to the aid of workers who were being attacked.
“It’s scary. It’s a scary situation,” said Tammy May, president of the PASNAP Butler chapter. May is a nurse in Butler Memorial Hospital’s intensive care unit and volunteers in her union role.
Some attacks against healthcare workers have been widely publicized this year.
In April, police say a man in State College tried to rape two nurses at Mount Nittany Medical Center. Court documents say he pulled one nurse by the hair, dragging her into his room and attempt to pull her pants down, then attacked another who tried to help and successfully pulled her pants down.
“It wasn’t until Monday that employees started finding out on Facebook and on the news,” said Erica Cornell, a travel nurse who was working at the hospital at the time of the attack. She said many of her colleagues were furious that they did not hear about the assaults from their employer first.
Other assaults are not publicized. 11 Investigates sat down with nurse Donna Ruhl, who suffered a traumatic brain injury after she was attacked by a patient. Months later, she continues undergoing intensive treatment, trying to rehabilitate her vision and return to work. She admits she is hesitant to go back to a similar nursing job.
“I don’t think I’ll ever be the same,” Ruhl said. “I don’t think I’ll ever trust a patient.”
In a tragic attack that made national headlines, a police officer died and several hospital employees were shot when a patient’s family member went to a York hospital in February and held employees hostage in the ICU.
“I don’t think you can ever recover from something like that,” said Annale Yobbi. “It’s a gut punch.”
Yobbi has been a LifeFlight nurse with Allegheny General Hospital for 33 years. She also co-chairs the hospital’s workplace violence committee. It’s made up of hospital security, leaders and staff members.
She said her hospital has been proactive, adding weapons detection systems and even developing an 8-hour crisis prevention course to teach de-escalation.
“I want to do what I can to help and protect them,” Yobbi said in an emotional interview. “I have a lot of mama bear when it comes to stuff like this.”
11 Investigates exclusively surveyed health care workers across Pennsylvania and received more than 500 responses. The respondents include doctors, nurses, technicians and aides. Forty percent work in urban settings. Thirty-three percent said they work in suburban areas, and 27 percent work in rural areas.
Eighty-nine percent said they had experienced physical violence by a patient. More than half of those people, or 55 percent, said they were injured in the incident(s).
Of those surveyed, 93 percent said they felt afraid at work due to violence concerns “at least sometimes.” Eighteen percent of those surveyed said they felt afraid at work “most days” or “every day.”
The survey found 64 percent of healthcare workers surveyed said they have had at least one physically violent encounter, with a patient or visitor, within the last year.
“It happens on the daily,” May said. “I still think workplace violence is underreported.”
May said there has been an issue with patients hurting nurses for as long as she’s been in the profession, over thirty years. But she says the incidents are becoming more common and are often more violent than what she’s witnessed in the past. She believes the younger generation of nurses is less tolerating of violence, and that group is empowering more senior nurses to speak up and push back.
There is growing frustration statewide with how employers are responding to violence concerns in the healthcare industry. Ninety-two of the survey respondents said their employer is not doing enough to prevent violence.
In Butler, those frustrations reached a breaking point in the spring.
The nurse’s union did an informational picket and voted to authorize a strike over workplace violence concerns.
Our wages weren’t our primary focus… We wanted safety and security,” May said.
Those nurses got what they asked for, including a commitment for more metal detectors and guards in the emergency room.
Still, the attacks in patient rooms persist. In just the last few weeks, nurses have been hit, pushed, spit on and punched. Criminal charges have been filed in some of the attacks.
Considering that, it is no surprise that 50 percent of the men and women who responded to the survey said they have considered leaving healthcare due to violence.
“Fifty percent wanting to leave doesn’t surprise me,” May said. “But yeah, I think for the average person, those numbers are going to seem astounding.”
So far, all of the hospitals and hospital systems contacted for this ongoing investigation have said safety is a top priority. None have agreed to an interview on the topic.
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