Encountering, Resolving, and Coping with Violence in the Clinical Healthcare Workplace

The Role of Medical Ethics, Risk Management and the Law

This timely course addresses the confluence of medicine, law, and ethics in practical terms designed to assist healthcare practitioners, hospital human resources and security departments, law enforcement, and attorneys to effectively deal with emerging day-to-day threats of violent persons and events in the healthcare arena. It is very practical in it’s content, providing the learners with useful tools to prevent, encounter, and cope with violence in the healthcare clinical workplace.

Healthcare workers are at an increased risk for workplace violence. From 2002 to 2013, incidents of serious workplace violence (those requiring days off for the injured worker to recuperate) were four times more common in healthcare than in private industry on average. In 2013, the broad “healthcare and social assistance” sector had 7.8 cases of serious workplace violence per 10,000 full-time employees.

Patients are the largest source of violence in healthcare settings, but they are not the only source. In 2013, 80 percent of serious violent incidents reported in healthcare settings were caused by interactions with patients. Other incidents were caused by visitors, coworkers, or other people.