ATLANTA— A Georgia Senate committee on Monday approved recommendations to lawmakers they hope will curtail violence against health care workers, a trend that has been increasing in recent years.  

According to U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration more than 21% of registered nurses and nursing students reported being physically assaulted, and 50% of workplace violence incidents are in health care; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in 2018 that health care workers accounted for 73 percent of all nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses due to violence in 2018.

“For health care workers, overall, there’s a 20% higher chance of being a victim of violence in the workplace than another industry,” said Vishal Bhalla, chief human resources officer for Atrium Health, which has more than a handful of locations in middle Georgia, including Milledgeville. “And in nursing it’s even higher. ..It’s definitely been on the rise in health care  and individuals are stressed much more with COVID.” 

Bhalla said most of the violent incidents — not limited to just physical — has occurred in psych areas and emergency departments. 

Among the recommendations from the Senate Study Committee on Violence Against Healthcare Workers are  establishing alerts systems, encouraging risk assessments while patients are being processed, training to hospital staff on how to interact with behavioral health patients and potentially violent patients, and providing deescalation and self defense training similar to law enforcement.  

“The committee learned that several law enforcement agencies are willing to partner with or have already partnered with area hospitals to help train health care workers and dealing with potentially violent individuals,” said Sen. Kay Kirkpatrick, R-Marietta, the committee’s chairman. “This training emphasizes the same de escalation techniques utilized by law enforcement as well as some basic self defense.” 

Several health facilities, like Atrium Health, already have preventive measures in place to help curb violence. Bhala said more than 82% of its staff has received training in de-escalation and personal safety techniques, security awareness behaviors and emergency management, in addition to panic buttons and police security measures. 

Dr. Mohak Dave, an emergency room doctor for Northeast Georgia Health System, suggested the committee also include enhanced penalties for aggravated assault and aggravated battery to cover all health care workers, not just those in emergency departments where violent incidents more frequently occur.

Most states — nearly 40, including Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee and Mississippi—have laws designating enhanced penalties for assaults on nurses; However, Georgia is one of a handful of states—including Hawaii, North Carolina and South Carolina — with penalties  for violence against health care workers only applying to emergency department personnel, according to nursingworld.org.

“I gave a real world example of what we see even in the emergency departments here. We have inpatient nurses that are coming to manage patients that are in the emergency department waiting for a bed,” explained Dave, a member of the committee. “If there was an assault that occurred on that health care worker, because they’re waiting for a bed in the emergency department, they’re covered under standard. But if that patient had a bed available, and went upstairs and had no that staff member was assaulted, they’ve lost that protection and that  doesn’t make sense.”

The Committee ultimately included Dave’s suggestion in its final recommendations Monday. However, Kirkpatrick implied doubt on a law change specifically on that matter.  Kirkpatrick said reported crimes against health care workers are grouped with other public safety reports, implying difficulty in showing the need for penalty enhancements specific to health care workers cases.

“At this point in time, there’s no way to separate them out, the way that the (Georgia) code reads,” Kirkpatrick said. “And in addition, there already are penalties in place for aggravated assault and aggravated battery, so that the Prosecuting Attorney’s Council and also the Defense Bar did not feel that enhancing those penalties was going to deter anything or change anything.”