Hospital-Based Healthcare Workers Victims of Workplace Violence in Italy: A Scoping Review

Abstract

The aim of this scoping review is to synthesize the available evidence on the prevalence rates of healthcare workers being victims of violence perpetrated by patients and visitors in Italy. PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science and CINAHL were systematically searched from their inception to April 2021. Two authors independently assessed 1182 studies. All the scientific papers written in English or in Italian reporting primary quantitative and/or qualitative data on the prevalence of aggression or sexual harassment perpetrated by patients or visitors toward healthcare workers in Italy were included. Thirty-two papers were included in the review. The data extracted were summarized in a narrative synthesis organized in the following six thematic domains: 1. Methodology and study design; 2. Description of violent behavior; 3. Characteristics of health care staff involved in workplace violence (WPV); 4. Prevalence and form of WPV; 5. Context of WPV; and 6. Characteristics of violent patients and their relatives and/or visitors. The proportion of studies on WPV differed greatly across Italian regions, wards and professional roles of the healthcare workers. In general, the prevalence of WPV against healthcare workers in Italy is high, especially in psychiatric and emergency departments and among nurses and physicians, but further studies are needed in order to gather systematic evidence of this phenomenon. In Italy, and worldwide, there is an urgent need for governments, policy-makers and health institutions to prevent, monitor and manage WPV towards healthcare professionals.

Prevalence and health correlates of workplace violence and discrimination against hospital employees – a cross-sectional study in German-speaking Switzerland

“…Workplace violence or aggression is not a new phenomenon but a serious and growing problem that can be found in virtually all occupations [ 1 ]. And workplace violence is not a marginal phenomenon but rather an everyday event that is frequently observed and highly prevalent in social services and particularly in health care settings and among nurses [ 2 – 5 ]. And although workplace violence against health care workers is increasingly recognized and addressed in health (services) research, in public, practice and politics it always was and still is strongly underreported and largely ignored or tolerated [ 6 ].…”

“…Health care workers are particularly affected from workplace violence and regularly confronted with aggression from patients or their relatives mainly because they are in frequent or even daily contact with people in distress and despair and/or with mental health problems [ 19 ]. Among all health professionals, nurses and – to a lesser extent and at a lower frequency – also physicians are especially vulnerable and most exposed to workplace violence and frequently experience aggression from patients or relatives [ 2 , 5 , 6 , 15 , 20 ]. Workplace violence in general and physical aggression in particular occur most frequently in psychiatric institutions, nursing homes and emergency departments [ 3 , 6 , 14 , 17 , 21 , 22 ].…”

Analysis of Latent Classes and Factors Affecting them According to the Implementation of a Protection System Against Customer Bullying in Korea

“…In this study, it was a predictor of workplaces with high worker protection. Civilotti et al [29] claimed the necessity to monitor workers for effective violence prevention programs as well as the decrease of customers causing problems. A reason for workers' violence exposure is the lack of management attention to workplace violence, and security cameras and video monitoring must be set up to reduce violence [30].…”

Worker Characteristics and Measures Associated With Patient and Visitor Violence in the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Multilevel Regression Analysis From China

“…For many years, the prevalence and risk factors associated with PVV against HWs have been studied worldwide, previous studies discovered individual characteristics of perpetrator and victim ( 9 – 11 ), the HWs-patient and visitor interactions ( 12 ), the characteristics of the work environment ( 10 , 13 ), and the official organizational hospital policies ( 14 ) seem important in the occurrence of PVV ( 15 ). Recently, several studies have investigated the occurrence of workplace violence (WPV) against HWs during COVID-19 pandemic in China, estimating that the percentage of experienced WPV against HWs was from 17.9 to 20.4% during the COVID-19 outbreak (<1 year), and risk factors have been identified for individual characteristics of HWs ( 16 ).…”