A recent survey commissioned by the International Association of Healthcare Security and Safety Foundation found that there was a slight increase in violent crime at hospitals in the U.S. and Canada between 2012 and 2013, according to an article on the Security Info Watch website.

According to the study, there were 1,437 incidents of violent crime — murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assaults — reported during 2012 compared to 1,669 reported in 2013, an increase of 16 percent. There was also a nearly six percent increase in simple assaults in 2013 compared to 2012.

These statistics are based on responses from 206 U.S. and Canadian hospitals that took part in the survey.

The study showed a significant difference between the number of Workplace Violence Type 2 assaults (violence directed at employees by clients, patients, etc. for whom an organization provides services to), versus Type 1 (violent acts by criminals with no connection to the workplace) incidents, the article said. Type 2 assaults accounted for 75 percent of all aggravated assaults, and 93 percent of all assaults in 164 of the hospitals surveyed over the last two years.    

“Security departments of hospitals spend a lot of time focusing on Type 1 Workplace Violence incidents and while those are a significant portion of the violent crimes and assaults that occur on a hospital property, it really is those Type 2 assaults that are the most concerning. They occur with the most frequency in the U.S. and Canada and they are the ones that impact the employees more directly,” said Karim Vellani, author of the “2014 Healthcare Crime Survey.” 

Read the article.