Workplace Violence Prevention

of it in the Emergency Department after taking initial and follow-up surveys. Educational programs about the results were also provided to the participants, such as a post-education survey to increase knowledge of what constitutes as workplace violence. Results from this study indicated that after educational programs were implemented, nurses’ perceptions of workplace violence being part of the job were reduced by half and they had a better understanding of workplace violence and what kinds of actions represent it. Furthermore, reporting of violent incidents to superiors increased as a result of this study and nurses felt that the Emergency Department is able to be safer because of their increased awareness and reporting of violence (Stene,

Prevention strategies for workplace violence include prevention programs. A qualitative study conducted by Blando, Ridenour, Hartley, & Casteel (2014) in a New Jersey hospital aimed to uncover the perceived barriers of implementing workplace violence prevention programs for hospital staff. Two focus groups comprised of 13 people in one group and 14 people in the other group were asked to submit anonymous discussions about their thoughts about workplace violence prevention programs and what improvements were needed. Results from this study concluded there were seven common themes for barriers: no action taken after reporting violence, different perceptions of what is considered workplace violence, bullying, decreased management accountability, effect of money and management models, increased focus on customer service, and poor law enforcement and social service attitudes about mentally ill patients. Now that the barriers of prevention programs have been addressed, improvements can be made such as increased support from management, education for staff about workplace violence, and increase public policy awareness to help strengthen violence prevention

I had never had this type of training before, so I was immediately interested in learning about workplace violence. With this training, I was able to learn about the different types of workplace violence and use critical thinking skills for scenarios on how to de-escalate inappropriate or violent situations. After we completed this training, my nursing class had to post in our online discussion forum about our own personal experiences with workplace violence, what we learned from the required educational course, and what we would have done differently after receiving the training. While I was thinking of what to put down for my own experience for the discussion post, I realized how significant workplace violence is, especially in the health care setting. I knew I have been involved personally at work or during clinical with aggressive, agitated, or violent patients, but I did not associate it with the term ‘workplace violence’. Like many nurses today, workplace violence is unfortunately viewed as part of the job. After I received this training and learned about how prevalent workplace violence is, I knew I wanted to elaborate on it and do more research in order to bring light to a serious issue that has not had the recognition it