W4-Conflict in the Workplace

Post#2 by Audrey Gloria - Conflict in the Workplace

Working in the psychiatric setting I see many conflicts in the workplace, both between patient and staff, and between staff and supervising staff. A couple of years ago we had a very bad code in our unit between staff and an aggressive patient. During this event there were at least 3 different staff involved, one of which was pregnant. As a result of the code the pregnant staff was kicked in the abdomen and injured by the patient and did not receive the appropriate care following the incident. There were a few factors that served as a catalyst to this event in which the primary conflict was the staff member becoming injured during her pregnancy and not receiving the proper care. Some of the first few factors contributing to the event were in the primary prevention of the assault. The unit was short of staff at the time and the supervisor chose to take the patients out on fresh air break despite the lack of staff leaving the remainder inside the unit critically short. The ones who remained inside were the ones involved in the assault. Had they not gone outside there may have been adequate staff to manage the aggressive patient, at least without involving the pregnant staff which would have prevented the injury. With very little staff inside, there was no way to alert the other staff who were outside to come in to assist. The next contributing factor was the house supervisor who at the time when dealing with the injured employee minimized her feelings and concerns and provided the employee with an incomplete injury/accident report packet which impeded her entire process. This employee then had issues with her workers compensation case, from the doctor and so on with them relating her pains and problems to her pregnancy instead of her trauma and never providing her with any treatment or with an alternative physician. From that moment on the employee has had a grudge with management and her supervisors in the way that they handled her situation. The employee had a substantial decrease in morale, performance, and trust in the hospital. The staff had an increase number in call offs, despite getting paid or not. The staff would have an increased number of future conflicts with supervisors or even with coworkers as a result. In this case it was more than one nursing leader or supervisor that had a contributing factor in this scenario but the lack of concern and support for the staff resulted in the staff losing any sense of trust or security in the workplace. The staff still works there but barely and has very little respect for the supervisors and managers who had shown her little concern during or even after that incident. The behaviors of the employee or staff who was injured dramatically reflect that of the supervisors and managers that handled the situation. Their lack of concern, feeling, or respect is mirrored in the employees resulting behaviors.