An Approach to Understanding and Preventing Workplace Violence
The clinical setting is unique among workplaces. First, employees are held to the highest ethical standards of practice and customer care. The fundamental principle of health care is "primum non nocere" (first, do no harm).
Second, clients under treatment can turn on those that labor to help them. The reasons for the outbursts can range from fear to traumatic brain injury to frustration to an adverse drug reaction. Often, the patient cannot be held responsible for his or her violent outburst.
The challenge is that an attack by a client does not nullify the fundamental principle of health care. Pain cannot be inflicted upon the client regardless of the reason for the violent outburst. This puts health care workers in a difficult, but not impossible, situation.
Key Strategies
Conflict Resolution
Most incidents of workplace violence can be avoided. With the proper training and understanding of human interaction, violence in the workplace can be nearly eliminated. Our philosophy emphasizes conflict resolution over physical containment.
Compassionate ContainmentTM
No matter how well trained the staff, there are instances when physical containment cannot be avoided. For these scenarios, our specialized form of physical containment for the clinical setting is Compassionate ContainmentTM.
Our containment techniques are designed not to cause harm to the client, unlike police or street defense. Our Compassionate ContainmentTM method safely contains the patient while also protecting the health care worker. The goal is to minimize harm to all parties involved.