Newsletters

POSTED: February 28th, 2020
POSTED IN: EM Pulse - The Official Newsletter of MOCEP, January/February 2020, Resources, Workplace Violence,

As an emergency physician, you know the danger, ACEP knows the danger, but the public isn’t always as aware of the dangers physicians in the emergency department face every day.

It’s referred to as “the dirty little secret in healthcare” in a recent article aired by NBC. Also called an “Epidemic of Violence,” the number of physicians that report this danger and the hospitals that recognize and report on it is highly underreported. In a survey of over 3,500 emergency physicians, 47 percent said they had been assaulted, and 97percent of the time the assailant was a patient.

Stories like these are beginning to draw attention to these issues, and ACEP recently implemented a program “No Silence on ED Violence.” A website, www.StopEdViolence.org, has been created with resources and to encourage physicians to share their stories.