Nearly three in four ED staff face violence or aggression every week, survey reveals

Jeff Moore/PA

By Sarah Lowden

Around three-quarters of staff working in UK emergency departments have said they experience or witness violence and aggression at work on a daily or weekly basis, according to a survey.

Levels of violence towards NHS staff have “become intolerable”, the Royal College of Emergency Medicine RCEM said.

The college surveyed 2,126 staff and found 96% have experienced violence or aggression from patients or other members of the public.

Some 73% said this happened weekly or even daily, and two-thirds said the incidents involved discrimination against them.

One resident doctor told the survey: “Working in the ED, you brace yourself for a lot, but nothing truly prepares you for direct, hateful verbal abuse, especially when it’s racially charged.”

Meanwhile, an ED consultant told the survey that they had been kicked in the face by an aggressive patient lying on a trolley.

Only four per cent told RCEM that they always felt safe working in ED, and barely more than half (57%) felt safe most of the time.