Violence Against Healthcare Professionals; Is It A New Pandemic?

Abstract

Aim: Although violence is a public health problem in the workplace as well as in society, its incidence is increasing. Violence and fear of exposure reduce the quality of the health service provided, which negatively affects the employees, and paves the way for the emergence of new violence. Our aim in this study is to know the frequency, type and demographic data of violence against healthcare professionals that we see almost every day, and to make these events preventable with the precautions to be taken and the cause of these events. Material and Method: The data in this study includes 359 incidents of violence against healthcare workers from January 2018 to the end of June 2022. The date and time of the white code notifications, the gender, age, duty of the health worker who was exposed, the hospital unit where the incident took place and the type of violence were recorded. These data were grouped and analyzed. Results: It was observed that the number of physicians exposed to violence constituted the majority with 207 (57.7%). 224 (62.4%) of the attacks were recorded as verbal violence, 31 (8.6%) physical violence, and 104 (29.0%) both verbal and physical violence. There was a statistically significant increase in violence cases after the pandemic in the Emergency Department. Conclusion: Violence against healthcare professionals has not changed compared to before the pandemic, unlike the number of patients that decreased during the pandemic. This shows us that violence in health is a viral contagious situation like COVID-19. As all infectious diseases can be prevented with early intervention, treatment or preventive methods, social behavior patterns also need early intervention and protective methods without stereotyping.

Keywords

• covid-19
• şiddet
• sağlık çalışanı
• violence
• covid-19
• healthcare