Healthcare Workers Advocating for Zero Tolerance Policies for Frontline Abuse | The Canadian News

Recent reports show that healthcare workers across the country face increasing harassment and even violence at work as we move towards the two-year mark of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now, medical groups are calling for zero tolerance of any kind of abuse for frontline workers.

Emergency room physician and head of Calgary’s Department of Emergency Medicine, Dr. Eddy Lang, says workplace violence is becoming a big problem for emergency care providers.

“This can take many different forms.

“It could be family members who may be very frustrated and upset and express that towards healthcare providers. They could be patients who are in emotional distress or are very angry for a variety of reasons and have become, perhaps as a result of an underlying psychiatric mental illness or substance use problems, have now become insecure for themselves and those around them .

“We have a patient who, whether he knows it or not, can punch, grab, dig his nails into someone’s forearm and get very aggressive with our staff,” Lang said.

“It really only takes one aggressive incident for people to feel fear, (take) extended sick leave, and even quit.”

He says mental health has declined and substance abuse has increased over the course of the pandemic, leading to verbal and sometimes even physical outbursts.

“We know that alcohol consumption has increased. So we have the mental health stresses on the population due to the isolation that has occurred.

“Initially, we saw a lot of discouragement from people who lost their jobs and we saw a really dangerous and very tragic upswing in the opioid crisis.

“So all of those things were like the perfect storm that came together with people increasingly reporting to the emergency department in unsafe and hectic states.”

“We advocate for very clear expressions of non-tolerance for violence and any type of abuse in the emergency department, no matter where it comes from or who is responsible. And we need the resources and training to address it. “

Bonnie Gostola, vice president of the Alberta Provincial Employees Union (AUPE), says people are tired, angry, “pandemic” and taking it out on their members.

“It doesn’t really matter which side of the discussion you’re on, whether you’re vaccinated or not, people are tired and I think as a society we’re at our wits’ end,” he said in an interview. Thursday.

“We have been dealing with this pandemic for so long.

“We have had incidents at the Alberta facility where the public is taking their anger out on the people who are really there to help them and it is becoming an unacceptable place for us.”

She said that some members have submitted stories of being reprimanded and verbally abused. There have been no physical incidents yet, but Gostola worries that things will escalate.

She said there must be a fundamental change in culture.

“We’re really working to change the culture of how employers respond when incidents have happened to members and, you know, instead of the mentality of, ‘Well, what did you do wrong to incite a violent act?’ Whether it’s verbal or physical, it’s like, ‘How can we help you?’ “

The AUPE wants this change in mentality to be reflected in future negotiation agreements.

“It’s really about employers recognizing that these incidents are happening, it’s giving the victim of these violent incidents, because … they take many forms … the ability to say that they are really believed, that this is happening. , that they have the time to, you know, report it and get the tools to help them address it. “