Hospital staff fear abuse

Tim Parke, Auckland City Hospital clinical director, does not favour protective vests for his staff. Photo / Janna Dixon

Nurses may resort to wearing protective vests in some hospitals as assaults on medical staff continue to worry authorities.

Latest statistics show hundreds of attacks on nurses, doctors, security and administration staff each year.

The Auckland District Health Board spends $2.1 million each year on security to keep its staff safe.

But even so, in the past year 174 staff have been subjected to some form of assault. Nurses accounted for 152 of those cases.

At other DHBs, Canterbury had the highest number of assaults - 590, and 498 of those against nurses. Counties Manukau recorded 376 assaults, Waitemata, 141; Northland, 22; Capital and Coast, 71; Southland, 131 and Otago, 141.

New Zealand Nurses Organisation industrial adviser Glenda Alexander said nurses had to have their guard up to protect themselves in the workplace.

"The worst is verbal abuse. People attack if they think they are not getting treated quickly enough.

"It is of concern that some of the smaller things like pinches and kicks don't get reported because every assault is bad," she said.

"Most nurses see it as part of the job but some of the quite serious assaults can be pretty scary," she said.

Hospital staff dealt with unpredictable people in high-stress situations every day and had to be trained in de-escalation skills.

Nurses were often working on their own and if the number of assaults on them continued to rise protective vests would be needed, she said.

"Police vests are not a welcoming or caring thing for nurses to wear but they will be needed in certain situations."

Security officers at Christchurch Hospital and Hillmorton Hospital already wear protective vests to protect themselves against violent patients. Hillmorton is a psychiatric hospital in the city.

But Auckland Hospital's clinical director of the adult emergency department, Tim Parke, did not favour protective vests.

He was happy with the level of security at the hospital, he said. At least four security staff worked at any one time and systems were in place to deal with situations, including emergency sedation, escape routes and panic alarms.

"I believe [protective vests] would be going too far ... I think it would be unpopular with staff because of the impracticality of wearing a vest in the heat of the department and it hindering your ability to move around. We want to present a caring face to the community," he said.

Parke said minor assaults and incidents with aggressive patients were under-reported.

"If you work in ED you have a certain expectation that you will deal with volatile people.

"But most of the incidents we see involve alcohol-fuelled preventable aggression. People believe it is acceptable to abuse and assault hospital staff."

Figures show 74 assaults took place in Auckland Hospital's acute mental health unit and of those 50 were by patients in the 12 intensive care beds.

There were 19 assaults in the emergency department and 12 in the child and family unit, including a nurse who was knocked unconscious after being punched.