![Every 30 minutes, a caregiver is assaulted in hospitals](https://img.passeportsante.net/1000x526/2016-09-01/i49258-toutes-les-30-minutes-un-soignant-est-agresse-dans-les-hopitaux.jpg)
September 1, 2016.
According to a report from the National Observatory of Violence in Health (ONVS), every 30 minutes, a caregiver is attacked in hospitals in France.
In 2% of cases, it is violence with a weapon
More than 14,000 acts of violence were reported in French hospitals in 2014, according to an ONVS report. Around 10,000 reports concerned acts of violence against people and more than 4,000 concerned property damage. Unsurprisingly, the services most affected by this violence are psychiatric, emergency and geriatric services.
In 9 out of 10 cases, the acts of violence were from the patients or the people accompanying them. And the reasons for this violence can be many. However, two factors often come up: alcohol consumption and the waiting time considered excessive. In some cases, the assaults can turn out to be extremely serious: in 2% of cases, the nursing staff have had to deal with violence with a weapon that can go as far as a crime.
Violence is linked to suffering
” Violence is a social problem », Explains Dr Christophe Prudhomme, emergency physician at the Avicenne Hospital in Bobigny (Seine-Saint-Denis) to our colleagues at pourquoidocteur.fr. ” It increases in daily relationships in the hospital because there is suffering with people who have more and more socio-economic difficulties. Their first reaction, sometimes, is to express themselves with verbal or even physical violence when they are unhappy. And in the hospital, they have a lot of reasons to be. “
To face this violence, the National Observatory of Violence in Health recommends better train nursing staff, so that he can realize early enough the danger of the situation in which he finds himself and that he can manage the most sensitive situations peacefully.