NSW Hospitals: Western Sydney nurse criticised for sounding alarm after patient’s father threatened her

A western Sydney nurse says she was asked “is this real” after she called for help when a patient’s father threatened to attack her in the dead of night.

A western Sydney nurse was alone in a ward in the middle of the night when her life was threatened by the father of a sick child she was caring for.

When she hit the duress alarm multiple times – while fleeing the room – security asked her: “is this a real incident”.

When she made a report to NSW Health, and asked to raise it with police, she was scolded.

This is just one of dozens of horror stories in our state’s public hospital system to come to light, after The Sunday Telegraph revealed 1000 people had been charged by NSW Police for assaults on hospital grounds in 2023.

It can now be revealed NSW Health had 367 approved workers compensation claims related to assaults in the workplace in 2023.

Code Black - Sunday Telegraph

Embattled nurses threatened, assaulted and sexually abused at work have revealed a “systemic issue” of being reprimanded for calling ‘Code Black’ responses and hitting duress alarms when faced with dangerous situations at work.

NSW Nurses and Midwives association member and veteran nurse Sophia Halse said in her 16 years working in hospitals, she had “never had an experience, and repercussions like this”.

“I was providing life-saving treatment to a patient who was deteriorating quickly in the middle of the night,” she said. “The patient’s father berated me, advanced on me, he was throwing his arms around and threatening me before I fled the room.

“He said I needed to watch my back, that he would ‘punch my f**king head in’, if he saw me again.”

Pictured in Penrith is Sophia Halse. Picture: Tim Hunter.

The Penrith mother and clinician said she was in the midst of a dangerous situation, “and the response to the code black was inadequate”.

“In the past, security and staff have always responded no questions asked,” she said, “I have also never been reprimanded for calling a code black or reporting it.”

A NSW Health Ministry source, who did not wish to be named for fear of repercussion, told The Saturday Telegraph there was a “severe under-reporting of attacks on clinicians inside our hospital system”.

“The number of incidents in hospitals reported to police are miniscule, in comparison to what is actually going on inside our hospitals,” he said. “The real number of attacks on our staff is a closely-guarded secret.

“Thousands of reports of physical violence, sexual assaults and verbal threats are made each year in each hospital – but staff are discouraged from going to the police.”

Opposition Health spokesman Matt Kean called for NSW Health to “immediately release the number of attacks on frontline workers in our hospitals”.

Matt Kean. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

“The public and our health professionals deserve the right to know the number of attacks and threats health professionals face,” he said. “It would be wrong if there was a cover up of these figures.

“NSW nurses and doctors should be safe and be able to work without the fear of being attacked while saving lives in our hospitals.”

Assaults reported to NSW Police on hospital grounds have almost doubled in the last 10 years, increasing from 526 incidents in 2013 to 1036 last year.

A NSW Health spokesman told The Saturday Telegraph local health districts and Specialty Health Networks have a range of strategies toensure the safest possible environment for staff, patients and visitors including “multi-disciplinary Code Black response teams”.

“This includes the use of NSW Health security staff, (and) health and security assistants to assist clinical staff with the management of incidents,” she said.

“The safety of our staff and patients is our top priority and NSW Health has a zero-tolerance approach to violence or aggression against staff.”

The spokeswoman said staff are supported and encouraged to report physical assaults and serious threats of assault to both hospital management and NSW Police.

NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association General Secretary, Shaye Candish. Picture: Tim Hunter.

New South Wales Nurses and Midwives’ Association general secretary, Shaye Candish, said hospitals were seeing a rise in cases of physical violence and verbal aggression.

“This is unacceptable, nurses and midwives should feel safe at work,” she said. “As a result of these rising assaults, rates of psychological trauma among our nurses and midwives are also increasing.

“Violence is a systemic issue for healthcare workers, particularly frontline nurses and midwives, and many cases of violence and aggression go unreported.

“The state government needs to address violence against frontline workers in hospitals urgently before we see more nurses and midwives injured at work.”