After Hours Medical Care and Personal Safety Needs of Urban General Practitioners

暴力和侵略的经历在保健领域广泛存在。对全科医生（全科医生）在其工作环境中的暴力和攻击事件并不罕见。这些事件经常没有被报道，它们对全科医生造成的损失，无论是个人还是专业层面，都是未知的。一些卫生专业人员遭受暴力的频率和严重程度是极端的。这种经历可能会破坏全科医生的信心和承诺，并可能不可避免地对保健服务产生不利影响。英国的研究表明，针对全科医生的暴力正在增加，澳大利亚农村地区针对全科医生的暴力也在增加，但在我们的主要城市没有进行类似的研究。这项研究的目的是要求在新南威尔士州周围不同城市地区工作的全科医生描述他们处理暴力和侵略性患者的经历。这项研究将是澳大利亚首个此类研究，为了解城市地区全科医生遭受的暴力和攻击性行为的程度提供重要见解。医学期刊和一般媒体报道的一个主要关注领域是，对全科医生出诊的攻击有所增加，因此，该项目将特别关注提供下班后护理的全科医生。这项研究很重要，为了找出针对城市全科医生的暴力发生率，实际发生的暴力类型，发生的地点，施暴者是谁，以及针对全科医生的虐待可能产生的长期心理影响。这项研究的结果将被联邦政府和卫生部门用来规划更好的提供下班后医疗服务的方法。这些发现也可以用来教育全科医生和医科学生关于工作场所的安全问题。

Experiences of violence and aggression are widespread within the health care field. Episodes of violence and aggression against general practitioners (GPs) in their working environment are not uncommon. These incidents frequently go unreported and the toll they take on GPs, on a personal as well as a professional level, is unknown. The frequency and severity of violence experienced by some health professionals is extreme. Such experiences may undermine the confidence and commitment of GPs and may inevitably have detrimental effects on health care services. Studies in the UK indicate that violence against general practitioners is increasing, violence against GPs in rural areas of Australia is also increasing but there have been no comparable studies carried out in our major cities. This research aims to ask general practitioners working in a range of different urban areas around NSW to describe their experiences of dealing with violent and aggressive patients. The study will be the first of its kind in Australia to provide an important insight into the level of violent and aggressive behaviour GPs are subjected to in city areas. One of the key areas of concern that has been reported in medical journals and the general press has been an increase in attacks on GPs making house-calls, this project will therefore be particularly focussed on GPs who provide after hours care. This study is important so in order to find out exactly what the incidence of violence against our urban general practitioners is, what type of violence is actually occurring, where it is occurring, who the perpetrators are, and also what the longer term psychological effects of abuse against general practitioners may be. The findings from this study will be used by the Commonwealth Government and Health Departments to plan better ways of providing after hours medical care. The findings may also be used to educate GPs and medical students about safety in the workplace.