12th of March, European Day for raising awareness of the violence against the healthcare workers
Doctors Chamber: Zero tolerance for the violence against the healthcare workers
The violence against the healthcare workers gains intensity and system solutions are necessary in order to combat the above. These need to be implemented on national level as well on level of the healthcare institutions, pointed out the Doctors Chamber anent the 12th of March, the European Day for raising awareness of the violence against the healthcare workers, that this year has been commemorated for the fifth time.
“The Doctors Chamber finds any form of violence against the doctors and other healthcare workers to be inacceptable, regardless being verbal or physical or who the inflictor is. We all must show zero tolerance for any kind of aggressive or violent behaviour and such cases must be reported without any exception. It is necessary for the doctors to feel save in their working environment in order to perform their duty in treating the patients. Both the doctors and the patients are components of a system that is based on mutual respect and trust in order to achieve the final goal which is successful treatment of the patients” states Prof. Dr. Kalina Grivcheva Stardelova, President of the Doctors Chamber.
In the year 2023, on initiative of the Doctors Chamber, changes of the Criminal Code have been made, according to which, the violence against the healthcare workers is treated as violence against officials, and therefore is treated as a criminal act. The above considers the following as acts of violence - serious threats, insults, abuses, infliction of physical injuries or threats with weapons to doctors while they perform professional tasks. These are felonies that are punishable by a prison sentence.
The Chamber requests that all doctors report the violent incidents to the police and additionally to submit information of such to the Chamber. The Chamber collects this information in order to follow the actions of the authorized institutions and to propose measures and policies for overcoming such issues.
In the year 2017 along with the other chambers and the Ministry of Health, a Declaration has been signed – Terminate the violence against the healthcare workers. One of the principles of the Declaration was elaborating strategies and plans on national level and on level of the healthcare institutions for prevention of violence against healthcare workers. Another activity that was envisaged by the Declaration was providing a system that shall document all incidents of violence in the healthcare organization. This system had to be provided by the Government and the healthcare institutions. The Chamber encourages the authorized institutions to accelerate the implementation of this Declaration, given that only a safe environment for providing healthcare services guarantees a professional and quality health service for the patients.
In the survey conveyed by the Doctors Chamber two years ago – 78% of the doctors reported that they have been victims of some kind of violence on their workplace. Out of these percentage, 80% were exposed to a verbal violence, while 6.8% have experienced physical violence. Almost 70% of these assaults have never been reported.
