Disruptive behavior within the workplace

The aim of this study was to determine the incidence of disruptive behavior among nurses in the healthcare workplace, the details that are associated with its occurrence, and the organizational procedures utilized when disruptive incidents occur.

Healthcare workers have a higher risk of experiencing disruptive behavior among staff in the workplace compared to other industries, and nurses are more susceptible than other healthcare workers.

A quantitative, descriptive, survey design asked nurses if they had experienced disruptive behavior within the past 12 months and how this was handled by their organization. Disruptive behavior included any type of verbal abuse, electronic or e-mail abuse, or physical abuse within the work environment.

There were 2,821 participants that validated the occurrence of verbal, electronic, and physical disruptive behavior, and the majority rated their overall work environment to be at high risk of experiencing disruptive behavior at least once every 6 months.

Twenty-four statistically significant relationships were found with strongest associations (<0.001) between: age and electronic abuse; position and verbal abuse; position and physical abuse; years of experience and electronic abuse; susceptibility of the organization to workplace violence and position as well as education; missing work due to disruptive behavior and position; and feeling comfortable reporting the abuse and position as well as education.

It is evident that disruptive behavior exists verbally, electronically, and physically, and that the overall work environment is felt to be at high risk of experiencing repeated disruptive behavior.