Experiences of psychiatric nurses exposed to hostility from patients in a forensic ward.

BACKGROUND: Hostile behaviour is becoming a way of life in South Africa. Hostility prevails at all settings, including in the health sector. In a forensic ward psychiatric nurses are subjected to hostile behaviour by the patients.

AIM: The aim of the present study was to explore and describe the psychiatric nurses' experiences of hostile behaviour by patients in a forensic ward and make recommendations for nurse managers to empower these psychiatric nurses to cope with the patients' aggression.

METHOD: Qualitative, in-depth, phenomenological interviews were conducted with nine psychiatric nurses exposed to hostility from patients in a forensic ward. Recommendations were derived from the results from nurse managers to assist psychiatric nurses.

RESULTS: It became apparent from the findings that psychiatric nurses in a forensic ward work in a stressful environment. Hostile behaviour in the forensic ward is consistently experienced by the psychiatric nurses as hindering therapeutic relationships. The psychiatric nurses experienced being disempowered.

CONCLUSION: Psychiatric nurses experience hostile behaviour by patients in a forensic ward as disempowering. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSE MANAGEMENT: Nurse managers can facilitate psychiatric nurses' empowerment by providing them access to: information, support, resources, opportunity and growth.