Selected components of violence from the view of caring staff

Abstract

The title of my thesis is `Selected features of violence from the point of view of medical staff{\crq}. Whereas in the past violence in medical care was more likely to occur abroad, at present is has a growing tendency even in our country. Violence is not only a physical attack but occurs more often in verbal form. The thesis is divided into a theoretical and an empirical part. The theoretical part deals with explanation of the term aggression, types of aggression, personality of aggressor, aggressive patient and aggression management. The following part deals with interpersonal relationships in health care, relationships between a nurse and a patient, a nurse and another nurse, a nurse and a doctor. The term mobbing, its causes, aims and phases, are explained in the next part. Consequences of mobbing and defence against it are also mentioned. The objective of the thesis is to make a survey of frequency and types of attacks against medical staff by patients, nurses and an employer. Three hypotheses were set up which relate to given objectives. The first hypothesis assumes that probability of attack against medical worker varies depending on the workplace. The second hypothesis assumes that the most frequent type of violence is verbal abuse. The third hypothesis assumes that nurses are more threatened by mobbing than by bossing. The research set comprised of nurses and paramedics of Teaching hospital in Plzeň, Emergency medical service of the Plzeň region and the Centre of helicopter emergency medical service in Plzeň. The research was carried out by quantitative method, the questionnaire technique. The results were visualised using a pie chart and bar charts in MS Office Excel 2007. The objective of the thesis was accomplished. The research results confirmed the first hypothesis, i.e. that `probability of attack against medical worker varies depending on the workplace{\crq}. Differences between individual types of workplaces were proved, most attacks by patients occur in Anaesthesia-Resuscitation Department and Intensive Care Unit and by medical staff in Emergency medical service. The second hypothesis, i.e. `the most frequent type of violence is verbal abuse{\crq} was also confirmed because verbal abuse outnumbers physical attacks. The third hypothesis, i.e. that `nurses are more threatened by mobbing than by bossing{\crq} was also confirmed because the research results show that more problematic relationships are among individual medical staff than between medical staff and their superiors. All three hypotheses were confirmed and proved that violence in medical care does occur and that it occurs in considerable amount