Code Black calls for help from aggression on the rise in hospitals

Frontline health workers are calling for help dozens of times a day as aggressive patients, their families and strangers turn violent, new figures show.

Frightened frontline health workers are urgently calling for help from security guards an average of 36 times every day amid escalating levels of violent and threatening behaviour in public health facilities, new data shows.

Code Black calls for help by SA Health workers dealing with physically and verbally aggressive patients, families and members of the public jumped 2 per cent to 13,423 in 2022-23.

More recent attacks on health workers include nurses “ducking punches and projectiles” hurled by a berserk patient at a Riverland Hospital and two terrified nurses at Yorketown Hospital forced to flee to a “safe room” for 45 minutes after a patient grabbed two knives during a rampage.

Frontline hospital staff face escalating aggression. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Kelly Barnes

The calls for help by staff comes as a host of other challenges in public hospitals grow.

Catastrophic events causing death or harm, medication errors, falls and hospital acquired complications all rose.

Overall “incidents”, including relatively minor or those classed as near misses, rose from 76,989 to 78,806.

This was against a backdrop of emergency department arrivals jumping from 572,867 to 597,866 and admissions rising from 460,490 to 464,547.

Reports of public hospital “incidents” have soared in the past decade, partly due to staff being encouraged to report any problems — including those which cause no harm — in order to learn from the situation to avoid it happening again.

Among key challenges in public health care settings:

“SENTINEL” events causing death or serious harm rose from five to seven, including four catastrophic medication errors, a suicide in a psychiatric unit, a tragedy involving a mechanical restraint and a patient undergoing incorrect surgery;

MEDICATION errors rose from 12,399 to 13,125;

FALLS rose from 16,002 to 17,530 and while 55 per cent caused no harm, 157 resulted in significant harm or death which was down from 171 the previous year;

HOSPITAL acquired complications rose from 6383 to 6699.

SA Health stress that staff work hard to provide safe, high-quality care to patients and consumers accessing health services every day.

“There are times that a patient’s experience or outcome is not to the high standard we strive for, at these times it is even more important that we partner with patients, carers and the community,” a statement with the new data says.

“Feedback, good or bad, is encouraged and documented, ensuring adequate care and follow up for individuals and feedback for staff.

“Complaints are investigated with a quality improvement focus to identify opportunities for learning and change.

“While many incidents do not cause significant harm to patients, they provide rich information to prevent harm to patients in the future. Learning from incidents and near misses and sharing improvements that prevent harm is essential to create and maintain a safe, high-quality health service.”