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Aggression in Healthcare Work Environments and Its Related Psycho Health Consequences

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Handbook of Anger, Aggression, and Violence

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Abstract

The phenomenon of workplace violence is currently present in all work contexts and has been widely documented for several years. This is a global problem and constitutes an occupational risk that affects not only the dignity but also the health of professionals employed. Violence at work has only been investigated since the 1990s, its knowledge is still not widespread. Violence against healthcare workers is a problem of global significance and represents a phenomenon that has been growing rapidly in recent years for the healthcare professions. Nurses were mostly healthcare professions at serious risk to aggression episodes. The difficulty of uniquely defining workplace violence encouraged both research and development of prevention and intervention strategies to combat it, since it was unclear perceptions of how to understand the terms abuse, threats, aggression, and having a certain negative impact on their decision to report the event. It was therefore essential to formulate a standard definition of workplace violence to ascertain the extent of the problem at a statistical level and to more accurately measure its effects on individuals, families, and society.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Mental Health Department, Local Health Authority Bari, Bari, Italy

    Elsa Vitale

  2. Emergency Department, Local Health Authority Lecce, Lecce, Italy

    Roberto Lupo

  3. Nuovo Ospedale degli Infermi, Local Health Authority Biella, Biella, Italy

    Antonino Calabrò

  4. Laboratory of Biomedical Physics and Environment, Department of Mathematics and Physics “E. De Giorgi”, University of Salento, Lecce, Italy

    Luana Conte

  5. Laboratory of Interdisciplinary Research Applied to Medicine (DReAM), University of Salento and Local Health Authority, Lecce, Italy

    Luana Conte

Authors
  1. Elsa Vitale
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  2. Roberto Lupo
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  3. Antonino Calabrò
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  4. Luana Conte
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Elsa Vitale .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Health and Wellbeing, University of Suffolk, Ipswich, UK

    Colin R. Martin

  2. Faculty of Life Sciences and Medicine, King’s College London, London, UK

    Victor R. Preedy

  3. School of Life Sciences, University of Westminster, London, UK

    Vinood B. Patel

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Vitale, E., Lupo, R., Calabrò, A., Conte, L. (2023). Aggression in Healthcare Work Environments and Its Related Psycho Health Consequences. In: Martin, C.R., Preedy, V.R., Patel, V.B. (eds) Handbook of Anger, Aggression, and Violence. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-31547-3_52

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