A Toolbox to Diminish Lateral Violence in the Workplace

Lateral violence, also known as horizontal violence and workplace bullying, is extremely prevalent in nursing as it has been noted to impact up to 90% of nurses at some point in their career (Smith et al., 2010). Both novice and experienced nurses have reported being impacted by these behaviors which can be both overt and covert in nature. These behaviors can lead to “a decreased sense of well-being, physical health complaints, and depressive symptoms” (Dehue et al., 2012). The psychological and physical complaints range from sleep disturbance, anxiety symptoms, post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms and suicidal ideation to new onset cardiovascular disease symptoms (Christie & Jones, 2014). The outcomes of this type of abuse include loss of confidence and a lack of trust in coworkers as well as resignation and even the victims becoming the perpetrators of the behaviors (Stanton, 2015). Because of the multiple impacts this violence can have, the American Nurses Association (ANA) issued a “zero tolerance” policy for lateral violence and recommends that employers have resources available for nurses to learn to combat this type of violence (ANA, 2015).

The lateral violence toolkit is a compilation of resources including a presentation utilizing the most current research on the subject. These resources include a description of lateral violence with identified behaviors delineated in order to enable nurses to identify instances of violence in their own workplaces. Additionally, links to existing resources will be provided to allow for ease of access to identified communication techniques and training. Communication techniques to address lateral violence in the workplace will be briefly presented and further explicated in a linked presentation with videos demonstrating those techniques for modeling behavior. Finally, a presentation discussing effective techniques to decrease lateral violence is attached to inform nurse managers of how to incorporate the lateral violence toolkit into their unit.