Mental Health Expenditures: Association With Workplace Incivility and Bullying Among Hospital Patient Care Workers

Bullied workers have poor self-reported mental health; monetary costs of bullying exposure are unknown. We tested associations between bullying and health plan claims for mental health diagnoses.

We used data from 793 hospital workers who answered questions about bullying in a survey and subscribed to the group health plan. We used two-part models to test associations between types of incivility/bullying and mental health expenditures.

Workers experiencing incivility or bullying had greater odds of any mental health claims. Among claimants, unexposed workers spent $792, those experiencing one type of incivility or bullying spent $1557 (P for difference from unexposed = 0.016), those experiencing two types spent $928 (P = 0.503), and those experiencing three types spent $1446 (P = 0.040).

Workplace incivility and bullying may carry monetary costs to employers, which could be controlled through work environment modification.