Joint Commission workplace violence prevention standards summarized

As part of its efforts to prevent workplace violence in hospitals on a national scale, the Joint Commission issued standards to help hospitals establish a strong culture of safety and violence prevention. These standards, and the reasons they were needed, are summarized in a recent issue of the Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety. The article addressed barriers to addressing workplace violence, stressed the importance of ongoing data collection and analysis to mitigate violence, and emphasized workplace violence is “an organizational issue that necessitates a systems’ approach.”