Examining the Relationship Between Workplace Violence and Mental Health Among Emergency Nurses

Posted: Apr 14, 2023

• Brian Butler
• Brianna Ramirez
• Brooke Stewart

Abstract

Workplace violence represents a significant occupational hazard for healthcare professionals, with emergency department nurses experiencing particularly high rates of exposure to various forms of aggression. The existing literature has established correlations between workplace violence and negative mental health outcomes, yet the precise mechanisms, temporal dynamics, and moderating factors remain inadequately understood. Traditional research approaches have relied heavily on retrospective self-report measures, which are subject to recall bias and fail to capture the immediate psychological and physiological responses to violent incidents. This study addresses these methodological limitations through an innovative ecological momentary assessment framework that captures real-time data on violence exposure and mental health indicators. The emergency department environment presents unique challenges for nursing staff, characterized by high-stakes decision-making, unpredictable patient populations, and frequent exposure to traumatic events. Within this context, workplace violence manifests in multiple forms, ranging from verbal abuse and threats to physical assaults. Previous research has typically treated workplace violence as a unitary construct or employed broad categorizations that may obscure important distinctions in how different types of violence impact mental health. Our study advances this field by examining violence exposure as a