Workplace violence (WPV) is an important public health issue and a growing concern in Emergency Departments. To effectively address WPV in healthcare, we must change the paradigm for WPV within hospitals. To change the culture surrounding workplace violence, we aimed to: Define WPV, create a multidisciplinary team to develop a unified, hospital-wide WPV support structure, increase awareness of WPV at our institution, formalize the WPV reporting process, improve our database of WPV incidents, track actionable trends of WPV. The Hospital and ED WPV Prevention Programs demonstrate increased reporting, secondary to a cultural shift of increasing transparency and shared accountability.
Tool: Workplace Violence (WPV) Prevention Program
Problem: The Workplace Violence (WPV) Prevention Program aims to improve staff, patient, and visitor safety hospital-wide, increase awareness and culture of reporting, and address the need for streamlined reporting and analysis for understanding trends and mitigating the risk of workplace violence
Tool Selection: The WPV Prevention program was established to include an interdisciplinary, engaging, and structured approach for awareness, reporting, measuring, and developing strategies to reduce the risk of violence. The program aligned definitions and established an overall cultural shift to the way violence is identified, reported, and addressed within the hospital
Usage: Formal reporting processes and data analysis reports were established to track actionable trends. Monthly meetings are utilized to discuss initiatives and resources. Guiding documents, including the Hospital WPV Prevention Plan, Security Response Policy, and Reporting Workflow were developed. Interdisciplinary partners and frontline staff share valuable insight to drive initiatives
Results: Through robust, comprehensive data collection and actionable initiatives, the program continuously adapts to a changing patient care environment. The Emergency Subcommittee and WPV Prevention Champion program were established to encourage awareness. There is a noticeable shift in the culture of reporting and learning from WPV incidents within the hospital
