Evaluation of exposure to violence against doctors in health care facilities

Abstract

Objective: In this study, we aimed to investigate the violence against doctors in the city center of Edirne and prevalence of exposure to violence and experiences after the violence.

Methods: The sample of this study comprised of 772 medical doctors working in the city center of Edirne. We reached all of the doctors between 01.09.2015 and 01.02.2016 and explained our study. 433 doctors accepted to participate in our study. The data were collected by researchers using a questionnaire which includes 41 questions. Descriptive statistics, Mann-Whitney U, Chi-Square and Kruskall-Wallis H test were used for statistical analysis.

Results: In our study, 50.8% of participants stated that they have been exposed to violence at least once in the last year. 88.5% of the doctors were exposed to verbal violence throughout their career. When the academic careers increase, the frequency of exposure to violence decreases (p<0.001). The higher daily number of patients was also increasing the frequency of exposure to violence (p<0.001). Female doctors were exposed to violence more than male doctors (p<0.001). Young doctors who are in the first 10 years of their career exposed to violence much higher than others (p<0.001). According to the participants most common causes were delays and waits. Being unable to make the doctor to prescribe the requested drug, unable to get drugs or sick leave with no medical necessity are among the reasons to direct violence towards doctors.

Conclusion: As result of our study aiming to investigate the frequency, reasons and consequences of violence through the eyes of doctors, we can say the violence is still a serious problem in health and the doctors lose their motivations for work after faced violence. Another important result is, 9 out of every 10 doctors were faced violence at least once in their career. In order to prevent violence in health, everyone, from the patients to the ministry of health, hospital administrations, media, doctors must fulfill their own responsibilities. For permanent solutions of violence, we also need to investigate the patients’ point of views.