Patients’ bill of rights and effective factors of workplace violence against female nurses on duty at Ilam teaching hospitals

BACKGROUND: Workplace violence against female nurses is an increasing problem. In addition, recognizing the rights of patients can reduce such violence against female nurses. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to investigate workplace violence against female nurses in respect of patients' bill of rights at two public hospitals in Ilam in 2012. METHODS: In a descriptive cross-sectional research, workplace violence against female nurses was studied. Data were gathered employing a researcher made questionnaire filled out by 106 female nurses. The questionnaire was on workplace, physical and verbal violence of patients and their attendants, and also the patients' rights as respected by nursing staff. Permission of university ethics committee was obtained. Data analyses were done by T-test and ANOVA in SPSS software. RESULTS: Totally, 90.6 % and 15.1 % of the participants were subjected to verbal and physical assaults by patients, respectively during last year of the study. Further, 92.5% and 11.3% of nurses experienced verbal and physical assaults by the patients' attendants, respectively. Most of the nursing staff believed that reporting aggressive attacks to the concerned officials would not be useful. A negative significant correlation was found between the aggressions of patients with age as well as marital status of nurses, (P= 0.04). Furthermore, a significant association was seen between physical violence of patients and the nurses’ recognition of the patients' bill of rights (P= 0.03). CONCLUSIONS: Due to high rate of violence against female nurses, some proper and effective actions such as employing a trained security force along with legal punitive charges against violators through responsible officials are highly suggested.