Bullying in Healthcare Organizations: Impact on Nursing Practice Essay

Issue Description and Its Impact

Bullying takes a variety of forms, ranging from physical, such as kicks, punches, and inappropriate touches, to psychological – intimidation, insulting, and social exclusion. As a rule, the phenomenon develops only in the enabling environment. Typically, the development of bullying is associated with poor management, inexperience in resolving intra-organizational conflicts, and poor processes organization (Maggie, 2017). In this case, the victims are usually prominent individuals who have demonstrated intelligence, competence, a high level of education, and creativity in work. Another option is a situation where management purposefully uses bullying to eliminate unwanted employees (Maggie, 2017). If there was a major conflict among the personnel of a medical institution in the past, or if it is developing at the moment, this is the first sign that the organization has created conditions for bullying or mobbing.

Bullying in business entities is a common phenomenon, but the extent of its influence on the “production process” in healthcare and medicine institutions is only beginning to be recognized. Wright and Khatri (2015) discovered that person-related bullying was a reliable predictor of adverse psychological and behavioral responses and medical errors. Therefore, a workplace environment that is unsafe to medical staff also puts patients at risk. A less obvious, but no less dangerous consequence is the deterioration of organizational culture, non-compliance with the norms of bioethics, and medical deontology (Lever et al., 2019). In addition, the consequences of bullying are expressed in staff turnover, layoffs, and emotional and professional burnout. As reported by Edmonson and Zelonka (2019), 34% of nurses leave or consider leaving because of bullying. All of these negative phenomena are also associated with serious material costs, which are a burden on the organization.

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