Verbal and physical attacks on health workers surge as emotions boil during latest COVID-19 wave
Stressed health workers are now confronting volatile visitors and patients. “The verbal abuse, the name-calling, racial slurs … we’ve had broken bones, broken noses,” said one hospital official in Dallas.
BY KAREN BROOKS HARPER SEPT. 1, 2021
…“Our staff have been cursed at, screamed at, threatened with bodily harm and even had knives pulled on them,” said Jane McCurley, chief nursing executive for Methodist Healthcare System, speaking at a press conference five days after the incident in the children’s ER. “It is escalating. … It’s just a handful at each facility who have been extremely abusive. But there is definitely an increasing number of occurrences every day.”
… But the pandemic has exacerbated the stress that can escalate into threats and violence, as people are now contending with not just the virus but also job loss and other stresses, said Karen Garvey, vice president of patient safety and clinical risk management at Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas.
Garvey said confrontations at Parkland just this year have included “people being punched in the chest, having urine thrown on them and inappropriate sexual innuendos or behaviors in front of staff members. The verbal abuse, the name-calling, racial slurs … we’ve had broken bones, broken noses.”
More here
https://www.texastribune.org/2021/09/01/coronavirus-texas-hospital-attacks-health-workers/
= new reply since forum marked as read
To wear street clothes when coming & going & to hide employee ids.
Why aren't they being arrested?
