IT’S NOT OK TO HIT A NURSE

Registered Nurses will rally in Tampa Tuesday to call for legislative action to require hospitals to step up tough prevention plans to stem a growing spate of violence against nurses and other health workers in hospitals.

WHAT: Street Theater/Demonstration of Workplace Violence in Hospitals
WHEN: 3:30 PM, January 13, 2015
WHERE: Italian Club, 1731 East 7th Avenue, Tampa, FL 33605

National Nurses Organizing Committee, an affiliate of National Nurses United, the largest U.S. organization of nurses, is sponsoring the rally, which will also include a street theater action.

NNOC-Florida, which represents thousands of Florida RNs, is sponsoring a national conference of NNOC RNs from Texas, California, Missouri, Kansas and Nevada, all of whom are also calling for stepped up action to reduce hospital workplace violence.

Model legislation on the issue was enacted in California in September. Like the California law, proposed legislation in Florida would require hospitals to have comprehensive plans to assess and reduce factors that contribute to hospital violence, including inadequate staffing and security.

Such plans would also need to include personnel education and training programs to recognize and respond to potential violence, and improved reporting requirements.

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics demonstrates that healthcare workers are far more likely to be the victims of workplace violence than other workers. In 2007 a report commissioned by the National Institute of Occupational and Environmental Health found that nurses have the highest rate of victimization among occupations in the healthcare industry.

According to a study conducted in 2013 and published in 2014 by the Journal of Emergency Nursing, 76 percent of nurses with 10 years of experience or more reported that within the last year they had been the victims of workplace violence, and 30 percent of that was physical violence. While OSHA has issued guidelines for workplace violence prevention programs in hospitals, there is currently no federal statute, nor state statute in Florida, that mandates that hospitals follow them.

Tuesday’s action will address several recent local and national examples of workplace violence in hospitals as part of an effort on the part of National Nurses Organizing Committee /National Nurses United to address the issue through legislation this year.

“Because my hospital has collective bargaining, we nurses were able to work with our administration to put measures in place that would allow nurses to receive training that could help to prevent future injury” says Tampa RN Louise Eastty.

“We want to ensure, however, that nurses and healthcare workers across the state don’t have to wait for the worst to happen before they get that training. This legislation will mandate that all hospitals put a workplace violence prevention program in place,” Eastty said.

Hospital violence also puts other patients, family members, and visitors at risk as well as nurses and other health workers, notes Bonnie Castillo, director of NNU’s Registered Nurse Response Network, who will speak at the rally.

“It is time that all hospitals have a zero tolerance policy for lax standards that put anyone in a hospital setting at potential risk. We need uniform standards that put safety as a top priority, and makes it clear that safer standards is a top responsibility for every hospital,” Castillo said.

The nurses will engage in street theater in front of the Italian Club on 1731 E 7^th Avenue at 3:30 PM. It is expected that almost 100 nurses will be in attendance. Nurses from local hospitals in the Tampa Bay area will be sharing their personal stories as part of the action.