Evaluation of an Education and Training Program to Prevent and Manage Patients’ Violence in a Mental Health Setting: A Pretest-Posttest Intervention Study

Abstract

Workplace violence can lead to serious consequences for victims, organizations, and society. Most workplace violence prevention programs aim to train staff to better recognize and safely manage at-risk situations. The Omega education and training program was developed in Canada in 1999, and has since been used to teach healthcare and mental health workers the skills needed to effectively intervene in situations of aggression. The present study was designed to assess the impact of Omega on employee psychological distress, confidence in coping, and perceived exposure to violence. This program was offered to 105 employees in a psychiatric hospital in Montreal, Canada. Eighty-nine of them accepted to participate. Questionnaires were completed before the training, after a short period of time (M = 109 days) and at follow-up (M = 441 days). Repeated-measures ANOVAs and Cohen’s d effect sizes were calculated. Results demonstrated statistically significant improvements in short-term and follow-up posttest scores of psychological distress, confidence in coping, and in levels of exposure to violence. This study is one of very few to demonstrate the positive impact of this training program. Further research is needed to understand how to improve the effectiveness of the program, especially among participants resistant to change.

Educational Training Intervention on Workplace Violence Among Healthcare Workers

“…The modules used in these studies were de-escalating techniques or other preventive techniques, recognizing the early sign of violence, communication skills, responsibility or the workers, notification and post incident procedure, and also legal aspect of workplace violence. Deescalating techniques and preventive techniques were used in 10 out of 12 studies (Glass et al, 2017;Gillespie et al, 2012;Dean, C., 2004;Oostrom, J. K., & van Mierlo, H., 2008;Beech B., 2001;Grenyer et al, 2004;Guay et al, 2016;McDonnell et al, 2008;Lamont et al, 2012;Cahill, D., 2008).…”

“…Recognizing the early sign of violence module was used in 8 out of 12 studies (Glass et al, 2017;Gillespie et al, 2012;Al-Ali et al, 2016;Oostrom, J. K., & van Mierlo, H., 2008;Beech B., 2001;Grenyer et al, 2004;Guay et al, 2016;Cahill, D., 2008). Nine out of 12 studies include communication skill training in their intervention (Glass et al, 2017;Gillespie et al, 2012;Dean, C., 2004;Oostrom, J. K., & van Mierlo, H., 2008;Beech B., 2001;Grenyer et al, 2004;Guay et al, 2016;Cahill, D., 2008) Responsibility of workers aspect were included in 3 of the studies intervention (Gillespie et al, 2012;Dean, C., 2004;Grenyer et al, 2004). Notification and post violence incident aspect were also included in 3 of the studies intervention (Gillespie et al, 2012;Al-Ali et al, 2016;Guay et al, 2016).…”

“…Nine out of 12 studies include communication skill training in their intervention (Glass et al, 2017;Gillespie et al, 2012;Dean, C., 2004;Oostrom, J. K., & van Mierlo, H., 2008;Beech B., 2001;Grenyer et al, 2004;Guay et al, 2016;Cahill, D., 2008) Responsibility of workers aspect were included in 3 of the studies intervention (Gillespie et al, 2012;Dean, C., 2004;Grenyer et al, 2004). Notification and post violence incident aspect were also included in 3 of the studies intervention (Gillespie et al, 2012;Al-Ali et al, 2016;Guay et al, 2016). Legal issues were included in the intervention by Al-Ali et al 2016, Beech (2001), Grenyer et al (2004), McDonnell et al, (2008, Cahill (2008) and Kontio et al (2011) in their intervention.…”

“…Some mode of delivery of the training are given in computer-based learning (Glass et al, 2017;Gillespie et al, 2012;Kontio et al, 2011). Other studies used lecture and discussion (Al-Ali et al, 2016;Oostrom, J. K., & van Mierlo, H., 2008;Beech B., 2001;Grenyer et al, 2004;Guay et al, 2016;Cahill, D., 2008). Majority of the studies include role play method of intervention used in their mode of delivery (Glass et al, 2017;Gillespie et al, 2012;Al-Ali et al, 2016;Oostrom, J. K., & van Mierlo, H., 2008;Beech B., 2001;Grenyer et al, 2004;Guay et al, 2016;McDonnell et al, 2008;Lamont et al, 2012;Cahill, D., 2008).…”

Promoting Workplace Safety: Teaching Conflict Management and De-Escalation Skills in Graduate Medical Education

“…Training has been shown to improve trainee confidence levels and performance in CMD, and may improve the safety and emotional well-being of the health professional. 16,17 To our knowledge, there are no CMD training guidelines for resident physicians. There are general recommendations for remediating residents in patientcentered communication skills (eg, discuss patient interactions with faculty mentor), but the only recommendation specific to CMD requires outsourcing the training (eg, attending conflict resolution and communication courses).…”