Investigating methods to decrease bullying, harassment and lateral violence in the perinatal nursing workplace

Current studies reveal that nursing is beginning to evolve from a profession driven by caring to meet the needs of others to one of self-interest and misappropriated energy. Nurse bullying, harassment and lateral or horizontal violence behaviors (BHLV), can undermine nurses' trust in others as well as the trust others bestow upon nurses. The purpose of this research was to develop and systematically test a theoretically-based BHLV educational intervention with nurses in clinical settings. Descriptive and Wilcoxon rank sum statistics were used to evaluate the effectiveness of the workplace intervention program in increasing nurse's recognition of BHLV and knowledge of strategies for reducing BHLV behaviors in perinatal nurses. The results of this study show that nurses' knowledge of BHLV and strategies for management of the behaviors were significantly increased after the intervention. Reduction in exposure to BHLV behaviors in the pre versus post intervention group, as measured by the instruments used in this study, were not significant 6 weeks after the educational program. This research supports the need for evidence based educational pathways toward the prevention or correction of this phenomenon before it erodes the nurse's role.