Workplace violence in trauma centers: an American Trauma Society Position Statement

In 1966, the National Academy of Sciences and National Research Council published 'Accidental Death and Disability: the Neglected Disease of Modern Society' which served as a national call to action to address the apparent public apathy towards the devastating and unnecessary toll that injury was taking on America. This white paper recommended the establishment of a National Trauma Association to drive public demand for injury prevention and mitigation. The American Association for the Surgery of Trauma heeding that call, founded the American Trauma Society (ATS) in 1968. Since its founding and with a mission of 'Save Lives. Improve Care. Empowering Survivors', the ATS has had a 56-year legacy of service to improve trauma care by providing professional and public education, advocacy for injury and violence prevention, and attending to the unique needs of trauma survivors and their families. As a focus of the ATS's advocacy efforts, the ATS's Legislative and Policy Committee (LPC) formulates the organization's legislative goals and strategy by reviewing proposed legislation and regulations that may favorably or adversely affect trauma professionals, and disseminating key information as position statements to the membership and public for edification and/or action. In accordance with this effort, the ATS has partnered with the Trauma Surgery and Acute Care Open to publish these important collaborative endeavors. For this inaugural publication of an ATS position statement, the topic we chose is workplace violence (WPV) in trauma centers. A work group of the ATS's LPC reviewed current literature gathered from a variety of organizational and agency sources addressing safety and protection of healthcare providers from WPV including federal and state legislative and regulatory initiatives. Based on the work groups review, we provide eight recommendations regarding the prevention, mitigation, or handling of WPV. We also review and discuss best practices and risk mitigation strategies, providing a listing of them in an accompanying appendix.