Negative interactions among nurses: An explorative study on lateral violence and bullying in nursing work settings

Background: Lateral violence and bullying affect nurses’ professional and health status. Worldwide prevalence ranges from 1% to 87%. Aim: To investigate prevalence and risk factors of lateral violence and bullying among Italian nurse peers in different work settings, inside and outside hospitals. Methods: Web survey using the 17-item “Negative Interactions Among Nurses Questionnaire.” Emails were sent to 5,009 nurses in three Tuscan public health care institutions. Results: Response rate was 18.6% (n = 930). Twenty-six respondents were removed as they reported working with no peer colleagues. Negative interactions were experienced by 35.8% (n = 324), 42.3% of whom (n = 137) were bullied. Psycho-physical consequences of negative interactions were reported by 59% (n = 191). Victims who thought of leaving nursing were 21.9% (n = 71). Conclusions: Lateral violence and bullying among nurses are consistently present in all studied settings. Implications for Nursing Management: Nurse managers could play a crucial role in preventing negative interactions among nurses. Strategies could include continuing education programs to promote awareness of this problem; implementation of an anonymous reporting system for bullying; introduction of occupational psychologists in wards with larger numbers of reported negative interactions and bullying; and increasing changes in staff composition within shifts.