The number of violent assaults on healthcare workers has more than trebled in the past six years, with attacks now running at more than one a week.
The increase, documented in a report published yesterday by the Health and Safety Authority (HSA), was described as frightening by the Minister of State for Labour, Trade and Consumer Affairs, Mr Tom Kitt, who launched the report.
He said it was unacceptable that, in some instances, employers in the sector were not releasing staff for training in health and safety issues.
The report found the number of reported injuries due to assault in the health and social work sectors increased from 24 in 1994 to 80 in 1999. There were 42 assaults reported last year, but the authority said this figure was incomplete and was expected to increase due to late reporting of assaults.
The areas where aggression and violence were most likely to occur, according to the report, were in accident and emergency departments of hospitals and psychiatric and learning disability units. Community workers, nurses, medical and paramedical staff were also in danger of aggression and violence, it said.
Ms Lenore Mrkwicka, chairwoman of the HSA advisory committee on health services which compiled the report, its first since 1992, said health service employers must recognise that all aggression and violence in the workplace was unacceptable. "It is critical that such incidents are addressed systematically by healthcare organisations," she said.
The most common type of injury reported by workers was those sustained while handling, lifting or carrying. The next type was slips, trips or falls, with maliciously perpetrated injuries accounting for the third-largest category.
Ms Mrkwicka said needles-tick injuries were not normally reported to the HSA because absence from work for more than three days was the criterion which made an accident notifiable.
A total of 2,552 accidents were notified to health board insurers between 1994 and 2000. These represent actual and potential employee claims, and 40 per cent of them were lodged by attendants/domestics and 30 per cent by nurses.
A further 235 insurance claims were made by employees of the Dublin Voluntary Hospital Group in the same period. The major hospitals within the group include Tallaght Hospital, the Mater, Beaumont, St James's, St Vincent's and Temple Street Children's Hospital. Some 100,000 people work in the health-services sector in the Republic.
The report noted there was under-reporting of accidents and recommended that all incidents be reported and recorded. The health sector should introduce a standardised report form, it said.
Ms Mrkwicka said training also needed to be developed to help staff deal with potentially aggressive and violent patients. The HSA will carry out inspections during the year to enforce safety measures for health-sector staff.
The authority will also meet health board CEOs to impress on them the importance of implementing the report's recommendations.
SIPTU's national nursing official, Mr Oliver McDonagh, said the lack of support for nurses and other healthcare workers subjected to assault in the workplace was appalling. They were often left to cope in isolation, he said.
The Mater Hospital said it had a record of 38 verbal attacks and 10 physical attacks on staff in the past eight months. There had also been three attacks on patients by other patients. It has installed a £9,000 security door from the waiting to the treatment area in its casualty department.