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(c) 2010-2024 Jon L Gelman, All Rights Reserved.

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Violence Occupational Hazards in Hospitals

Today's post was shared by Safe Healthy Workers and comes from www.cdc.gov

cover of Publication number 2002-101

About NIOSH

As part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) conducts research and makes recommendations to prevent work-related illness and injury. NIOSH works with industries, labor organizations, and universities to understand and improve worker safety and health.
NIOSH is often confused with OSHA (the Occupational Safety and Health Administration). However, NIOSH and OSHA are separate agencies with different functions. NIOSH is a CDC research agency in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. OSHA is a regulatory agency in the U.S. Department of Labor.

Introduction

Today more than 5 million U.S. hospital workers from many occupations perform a wide variety of duties. They are exposed to many safety and health hazards, including violence. Recent data indicate that hospital workers are at high risk for experiencing violence in the workplace. According to estimates of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), 2,637 nonfatal assaults on hospital workers occurred in 1999-a rate of 8.3 assaults per 10,000 workers. This rate is much higher than the rate of nonfatal assaults for all private-sector industries, which is 2 per 10,000 workers.
Several studies indicate that violence often takes place during times of high activity and interaction with patients, such as at meal times and during visiting hours and...
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