Around half of nurses and midwives report workplace aggression in the past month: 36% report violence from patients or visitors and 32% report bullying by colleagues

Over the course of their working life, few nurses escape this violence, and many are vulnerable to harm or injury stemming from exposure. 1 Though a growing body of research has drawn attention to the many forms of violence and aggression experienced by nurses, there is little empirical evidence about effective responses, and few large sample studies have appraised nurses' perceptions about the types of responses they find most useful. Generally, management intervention, policy development and education programmes about the nature of OV and WB are positioned as the primary solution to this problem. 1 The lackof satisfaction with support programmes and management interventions in this study, particularly for the group who experienced OV and WB, indicates much work is still required to develop effective interventions.