Nurses are not offered enough legal protection when patients attack them at work, according to lawyer Chris Cilia.
While the profession is heavily regulated to ensure nurses perform their duties correctly and ethically, there was a “vacuum” when it came to protection against violence, said Dr Cilia, who is the lawyer of the Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses.
The law treated a nurse attacked by a patient like any citizen who was assaulted.
This meant that the nurse had to file a police report, said Dr Cilia, who is also a Labour Party candidate. As a consequence of this lack of “special regulations” protecting nurses, there were no automatic remedies in place.
So, following an assault, there was nothing formally stating that the nurse would no longer work with the aggressive patient.
Dr Cilia said he was aware of cases when patients accused nurses of abusing them, fully aware that this would mean automatic suspension on half pay until the court case was concluded.
Dr Cilia added the law allowed the Council of Nurses and Midwives to recommend legal amendments. “The council needs to be more proactive and do something to protect its people,” he said.
He was speaking during a two-day seminar organised by the Maltese Association of Psychiatric Nurses to discuss violence and aggression in healthcare.
Psychiatric nurse Marcia Gafà said that assaults on nurses were increasing and the situation was more delicate when they worked with mental health patients.
She spoke about the lack of policies in place in hospitals, including Mount Carmel, to train and educate nurses on how to handle cases of aggression.
This was backed up by another nurse, Tiziana Portelli, who carried out research within Mount Carmel Hospital and found the majority of nurses did not get such training.
Her research involved a questionnaire that was filled in by 56 nurses. Most spoke about the lack of training and need for a policy.
Forensic psychologist Kevin Sammut Henwood said violent behaviour was “neither random nor blind” and happened for a reason – usually because the person wanted to gain control of the situation.
Aggressive and violent behaviour was often caused by poor coping skills, an inability to correctly identify sources of stress and low frustration tolerance level, he said.
Health Minister Joe Cassar said aggression and violent behaviour were on the rise.
“The challenge is to ensure healthcare professionals are well equipped, effectively and therapeutically educated, trained and supported,” he added.
Community Care Parliamentary Secretary Mario Galea said training had started a few weeks ago and 14 nurses at Mount Carmel were now qualified to train their colleagues.
He said the Mental Health Act, which has been in the pipeline for more than a decade, will “hopefully” be discussed in Parliament over the next few weeks. This law was very important as it gave more weight to patients’ rights, he said.