practice to their fullest capacity," said Castillo. "A degraded, damaged,
and precarious environment for nurses directly undermines the qual-
ity of care patients receive. When the nurse is at risk, the patient is at
risk. And when the patient is at risk, the community is at risk."
With workplace violence, solutions to prevent violence are of
course always preferable to dealing with violence after it occurs. And
workplace safety experts, also known as industrial hygienists,
already know what works well to prevent violence in healthcare set-
tings. The causes and solutions are no secret. The single most
important aggravating factor in workplace violence is understaffing.
Other major risk factors include the patient's mental and medica-
tion condition and history of violence; the presence of anything that
could be used as a weapon; dimly lit and isolated work spaces;
crowded conditions and long waits; lack of security; and the overall
lack of mental healthcare for the population.
Governments, hospitals, and healthcare systems could largely
remove or drastically reduce almost all of these risk factors if they sim-
ply invested the funds necessary to provide safe, high-quality patient
care. Instead, healthcare systems are dominated or controlled by cor-
porations, private interests, and neoliberal policies that commodify
healthcare as something to be bought and sold in order to generate
M AY | J U N E 2 0 1 6 W W W . N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G N A T I O N A L N U R S E 15
From opposite page clockwise across all pages: A Canadian RN depicted in
a Manitoba Nurses Union campaign against workplace violence; Nova Scotia
RNs march; Australian RNs in New South Wales protest unsafe hospitals; RNs
in Uruguay march for safe schedules; South Korean RNs hold anonymous
discussion to speak freely about hospital violence; Irish RNs campaign for
safe workplaces; Ontario nurses rally to protect themselves, patients.
BOTTOM
LEFT:
LISA
MOYLES
