Hi Tara, Ienjoyed reading your DNP project.
It isa very interesting topic to me. Being apsychiatric nurse for the past 21 years, I had experienced workplace violence (WPV)first hand both in inpatient settings and in psychiatric emergency rooms. Healthcareworkers are expected to be 4 times more likely exposed toworkplace violence 4 times more than non-healthcare settings (OSHA, 2015). Organizations’commitment and staffs’ participation are crucial elements of an effective WPVprevention program (OSHA, 2015). Regulatoryagencies expect employers to assess their employees’ work environment for therisk factors they are actually or potentially exposed to. Althoughagitated and aggressive patients can be found throughout healthcare settings,behavioral health services (BHS) are expected to deal with those types ofclients on a daily basis.
As an Office of Mental Health (OMH)operated facility, our hospital use the annual training program Preventing andManaging Crisis Situations (PMCS) to provide specific skills for preventing,de-escalating and managing aggressive behavior in BHS. It is mandatory for all direct care staff ofBHS to attend this initial two-day program, and an annual one-day programtraining successively. Our hospital is in the process of expanding PMCS programto the medical emergency room staff including the hospital police. PMCS, which offers essentials oftrauma-informed and recovery-oriented care, has proven to be a successful toolin enhancing the safety of both staff and recipients in an emergency situation,with the main focus on prevention through the development of staff competenciesin day-to-day effective interactions (OMH, 2001).
