Health Care Violence and Abuse towards Nurses in Hospitals in North of Iran

AIM: In the current survey, we explored the prevalence of verbal and physical abuse against the nurses in different hospitals of north of Iran. METHODS: We performed a cross-sectional survey. Nurses were interviewed using a standardized questionnaire (Staff Observation Scale Revised (SOAS-R)). The sample covered 400 participants from 5 hospitals of Mazandaran University of medical sciences, Sari, Iran. RESULTS: The sampling size involved 271 participants (271 forms from 400 forms (sampling population) were filled completely) including 193 female (71.2%) and 78 male (28.8%) participants. 79 (29.1%) participants experienced physical abuse and 260 (95.9%) participants were abused verbally. It was noted that in 35 cases (44.3%) the patients were the source of physical abuse and in 44 cases (55.6%) the members of patients’ family were the source. In 79 (30.3%) cases the patients were the source of verbal violence and in 139 (53.4%) cases the members of patients’ family were the source and in 42 (16.1%) cases coworkers were the sources. CONCLUSION: Verbal abuse was a common type of violence in our study in north of Iran. There is a requirement to increase awareness about this significant problem among health care workers.