Personal Safety for Staff Medical Personnel
Physical assaults on staff are becoming more and more common. For any organisation, violence to staff can lead to low morale, stress and a poor company image.

For staff, violence can cause pain, suffering, disability and even death. Violence, like any other Health & Safety risk, must be assessed and managed.

Whether you are an employee or an employer, Security And Safety can have a course tailor made to your specific requirements. We teach a wide range of staff from Police Officers to hospital staff, Council employees to volunteer groups. We even visit Universities and Schools to teach students (and sometimes the teachers as well).

In fact, any employee who feels they may work in a dangerous environment or feels that they would benefit from knowing how to defend themselves should be on one of our courses. But don't take our word for it, see what the Law and your governing bodies have to say.



Violence and aggression against NHS staff results from a complex combination of personal and situational reasons including anxiety, medical or psychological conditions, drugs or alcohol and it is difficult to predict what could trigger an incident. A 1997 National Audit Office report on Health & Safety in the NHS stated that "training should be given to educate staff on how to avoid or defuse potentially violent situations and how to respond appropriately to incidents of violence."

The report recommended that employers "must ensure that staff are given appropriate training on recruitment and when exposed to new or increased risks. This training should be ongoing so as to maximise an employees competence as competence will decline if skills and knowledge are not regularly used or refreshed."

This National Audit Office report concluded that "To succeed in attaining the high standards expected, hospital trusts should aim to develop a more proactive, rather than reactive, approach. This involves developing hospital wide strategies to minimise the level of accidents."

And in a covering letter from the Chief Executive of the NHS Executive, he stated "Ensuring a safe and healthy environment for both staff and patients is an important management task and should be a priority for every NHS employer."

The Health & Safety Executive has for many years advanced the view that there is no contradiction between Health & Safety and profitability. Those organisations which perform well and have high standards of Health & Safety are the most successful, irrespective of size or industry.

 A further National Audit Office report in 2003 stated " In the last 2 years the level of reported incidents of violence and aggression against NHS staff working in acute, mental health and ambulance Trusts has increased by 13%. Around 95,500 incidents were reported in 2001-02 and only a fifth of Trusts met the Department's national improvement target of a 20% reduction by April 2002."


The report went on to state that "nurses are up to four times as likely as other employees to experience an incident" and that "the estimated direct cost of work-related accidents due to acts of violence and aggression is likely to be at least £69 million a year. This excludes staff replacement costs and the human costs, such as stress, low morale, lost productivity and high staff turnover, which are known to be substantial."

The NAO also found that doctors, ancillary and support staff are still not receiving sufficient training. Even where personal safety / self defence training was taking place, it was often ineffective against a violent attack and the report specified that "a clear and consistent approach to dealing with violent individuals and incidents in NHS settings must be taken for this training to be effective."

The report summarised its findings by affirming "Effective staff training is crucial in tackling violence and aggression."

Retail personnel    
A recent survey carried out by the Independent Retail News, sponsored by Spar and supported by the British retail Consortium, showed that "the most common crime committed against retailers was shoplifting which was experienced by 88% of victims in the past year." What is even more astounding is that "62% of all assaults occur against staff when customer theft incidents are being dealt with" - yet little or no staff have had any formal training in how to deal with such incidents.

In the last year there has been a 5% increase in the number of victims of physical violence against retail staff.
 
Education Personnel    
A recent survey on incidents of violence against Local Authority school staff conducted by the Scottish Executive showed some frightening statistics. Violence, in this context, includes physical violence, verbal abuse and damage to personal property. The main findings were:

During 2000-2001, the total number of violent incidents against Local Authority school staff which were reported was 4,501, of which 35% occurred within the primary sector, 33% in the secondary sector, 30% in the special sector and 2% in pre-school centres of education.
Two-thirds of the incidents reported involved teaching staff. Of these, 3% were incidents which involved both teaching and non-teaching staff.
Around 7% of all incidents were notified to the Police. The proportion of incidents reported to the Police in special schools is less than half that in primary and secondary schools.
The total number of violent incidents recorded per 100,000 pupils was 569. The rate per 1,000 teachers was 60.
98% of incidents were recorded as occurring in school hours, with 48% taking place in the classroom.
Two-thirds of the incidents reported involved physical violence. Of these, 36% also involved verbal abuse. Verbal abuse alone made up the majority of the remainder with damage to personal property taking place in under 1% of the incidents.
In 92% of all incidents reported, the perpetrator was a current pupil of the school. Where this information was available, 59% of these incidents involved pupils with special educational needs (SEN). In 5% of all incidents, the perpetrator was recorded as a parent.
In total, 278 working days were recorded as being lost by school staff as a direct result of the 4,501 incidents of violence that were reported in 2000-2001. However, this total does not include figures for 2 of the 32 authorities, accounting for 4% of all pupils, which were unable to provide this information.
In June 1997, the then Scottish Office issued a circular (No 5/97) to Local Authorities in Scotland, informing them of a formal requirement to report, record and monitor incidents of violence against school staff. In circular 5/97, an incident of violence was defined as:

"any incident in which any employee of a school is seriously abused, is threatened or is assaulted by a pupil, parent, member of the public or any other persons in circumstances arising out of the course of his/her employment.

This includes physical attack and threatening behaviour with or without a weapon, and intentional damage to personal property."

This reflects the fact that violence is not restricted to acts of aggression that may result in physical harm but incorporates behaviour, including the use of gestures and language, that may cause the victim to become afraid or feel threatened or abused.

 

 The Scottish Executive collected and collated information from Local Authorities for the first time in 1998, and again in each August since. It should be noted that incidents of violence have steadily increased over the years:

1997-1998 : 743*
1998-1999: 1,898
1999-2000: 3,083
2000-2001: 4,501

Information not available from authorities covering 20% of pupils s of violence have steadily increased over the years:


 
Personal Security and Safety for your Staff  
It should be noted that violent attacks happen to all staff, not just female staff as is sometimes assumed. It should also be noted that there has been a worrying increase in male attacks, not only of a physical nature but also of a sexual nature.

Since male rape was made a criminal offence in 1994, Home Office statistics show a 400% rise in reported cases and recent research on men attending their GP has shown that "over 5% suffered sexual abuse as children and almost 3% reported non-consensual sexual experiences as adults."



You and the Law

So, if this is what employers are saying, what does the Law say?

RIDDOR 1995 Regulations, which came into effect on 1 April 1996, included an additional definition of an accident which is "an act of non-consensual physical violence done to a person at work." This makes the management and reporting of acts of violence mandatory under the Management of Health & Safety Regulations 1999.

Under Section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974, an employer "must provide such Information, Instruction, Training and Supervision, so as to ensure the health and safety of its employees."

Failure of an organisation to provide adequate controls and proper safe working practices can now result in management prosecution under gross negligence should a serious injury or fatality occur at work.



If "gross negligence" is proved, it can be classed as "management failure" and management can be prosecuted under new legislation and / or failing in their duty of care under the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. It may also be worth noting that if it can be proved that no current safe systems of work are currently in place and supported by policy, areas such as public and employer liability insurance may be void.


How can Security And
Safety assist you?

By offering you structured training programmes for your staff and management, specifically designed to deal with violence against staff, we can reduce the risk of accident, injury and in extreme cases, death, whilst improving an individuals coping ability through increased self-confidence and self-esteem.

The training programme also has the ability to have the training identified as part of the risk assessment process acceptable under Health & Safety at Work guidelines, thus ensuring that you, as an employer, are immediately complying with the responsibilities placed upon you by current and proposed law in reducing the risk of assaults against your staff.

Training

The training we give at Security And Safety involves identifying body language to stop a confrontation escalating, effective voice control techniques and self defence.

We do not use martial arts moves in any of our training sessions as these moves work well in a controlled environment, for instance a dojo, but do not work well in the street where an attacker does not abide by any pre-set rules.

We do however use simple techniques to teach course candidates the most effective way to defend themselves and break away from an attacker. These simple techniques can be adapted to any situation and, as they are so basic, candidates will find them easy to remember.

 

 

What are the benefits?

As an employer, your legal position will be improved as you will be complying with current law and your financial position will also improve through reductions in :

Staff absence and therefore overtime costs.
The costs of recruiting and training replacement staff through better staff retention.
Company injury benefit or pension costs.
Insurance premiums.
Fines for breaches of legislation.
Legal costs involved in defending possible court action.

also:

More competent staff by improved confidence and self esteem.
Implementable strategy.
Compliance with current law.
Risk Assessment implementation.

If you would like to book on a forthcoming course or if you would like to book a course specifically for your staff, please
E-mail Security and Safety


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