Staff at two Dorset hospitals suffer six months of abuse (From Bournemouth Echo)

Staff at two Dorset hospitals suffer six months of abuse

7:50pm Wednesday 9th September 2009 in

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EIGHTY staff at the Royal Bournemouth and Christchurch hospitals were victims of violence or aggression during the first six months of this year, new figures have rev-ealed.

A report being presented to the Royal Bournemouth and Christchurch Hospitals Foundation Trust board of directors on Friday shows that 40 members of staff bore the brunt of verbal and physical abuse from April to June. The same number was involved incidents of violence and aggression during the first quarter of the year.

Patient Safety and Staff Safety indicators for 2008/2009 show that the number of incidents has dropped dramatically since the last quarter of last year, when 72 members of staff were exposed to violence and aggression.

There have been 22 accidents involving the manual handling of patients so far this year and 131 accidents involving staff.

Staff have slipped, tripped or fallen 35 times this year and nine accidents have been reported to the Health and Safety Executive.

The number of patient falls has risen during the second quarter of this year but medication errors, resulting in harm, have dropped to one in every 1,000 admissions.

Patient safety incidents, by 1,000 admissions, rose to 43.9 while the MRSA screening rate from April to June was more than 95 per cent.

There have been 185 formal complaints so far this year with eight clinical claims and 150 Freedom of Information Act requests.

Of 83 complaints during the last quarter, 54 were upheld or partly upheld with two being reviewed by the Health Service Ombudsman.

The report, compiled by Joanne Sims, clinical governance associate director, reveals that from April to June this year there was one ‘serious untoward incident’ relating to a child’s death.

The trust paid out £1,075 to one stressed hospital visitor who witnessed a ceiling tile hit her husband on the head.