Patients' sexual harassment of nurses and nursing students: A cross-sectional study

Workplace sexual harassment towards nurses is a global phenomenon: approximately one quarter of all nurses are affected by sexual harassment. The extent and type of sexual harassment vary greatly depending on the country, culture, level of education, and care setting. Notably, patients are amongst the main perpetrators. Importantly, sexual harassment has serious consequences on nurses' health and work performance.

This study examined the prevalence of patients' workplace sexual harassment towards nurses and nursing students at a University of Applied Sciences in Switzerland.

A quantitative cross-sectional descriptive correlational design was used.

The survey was conducted at the university's Institute of Nursing under the Department of Health.

Nurses and nursing students who were studying or attending a continuing education programme and had worked as a nurse with direct contact with patients in the last 12 months could qualify as participants. A final sample of 251 participants was used for the analysis.

Data were collected using the 'Sexually Harassing Behaviour Questionnaire from an extraorganizational perspective'. Preliminary analysis involved computing the percentage and absolute frequencies, mean scores, standard deviations, and ranges. The hypotheses were tested using non-parametric tests, such as the Wilcoxon test for two independent samples, Spearman correlation test, and Kruskal-Wallis H test. Results were considered statistically significant at alpha < 0.05.

Most participating nurses were women (88.5%) and worked in adult acute care (54.2%). The mean age was 25.5 (SD = 7.5) years. On average, they had worked in the nursing profession for 7 years. 17.1% of the participants had received training on sexual harassment. Overall, 95.6% of the participants reported experiencing sexual harassment of any type at least once in the last 12 months. The most common type of harassment was verbal sexual harassment. Notably, sexual harassment was statistically significantly more frequent the younger the nurses were [r = -0.13, p = 0.046]. Furthermore, it was statistically significantly more prevalent in adult acute care than in paediatrics [H (10) = 18.4; p = 0.048; Cohen's d = 0.4].

Patients' sexual harassment of participant nurses and nursing students is highly common. The high prevalence of sexual harassment and low number of nurses who have received training on sexual harassment demonstrate the need for initiatives to address this phenomenon in the basic education of nurses. Furthermore, evidence-based interventions against sexual harassment in the nursing profession are needed.