Work Place Violence and Its Management in Uganda’s Regional Referral Hospitals.

Abstract

Incidences of work place violence are on the increase, and as a consequence, acts of violence in the work setting have been added on the list of occupational hazards. This study therefore sought to identify prevalent forms /nature of workplace violence (WPV), the perpetrators and victims as well as the casual factors of WPV. Other objectives of this were to identify the effects of WPV, coping mechanisms for victims and the possible remedial measures for WPV. Conducted from six regional referral hospitals of Uganda, the study used a descriptive cross-sectional design that employed both quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection and analysis. Data was collected from both health workers and the hospital managers. The 3 leading forms of WPV were; verbal abuse (63.6%), physical abuse (31.6%) and tribal harassment (30.5%). Sexual abuse though the least occurring form of WPV (8.1%), was the most traumatizing. Patients were the leading perpetrators of WPV occurrences for all forms and the most victimized health workers were the nurses. We recommend establishment of functional institutional WPV policies and committees in all hospitals. This entails assessment of hospitals for WPV needs, training of health workers about WPV and their rights, putting in place community mechanisms and deliberate measures to curb the occurrence of WPV. At the individual level, there is need for commitment to support anti-WPV actions. Partnership with the service recipients (Community) is needed to establish a common ground on the origins of WPV and how both the community and the hospitals can work towards reducing occurrence of WPV incidences, for purposes of better service provision.