Attacks on NHS staff hit 67,800 a year – up 25% in five years

Assaults on NHS staff have gone up 25% in the last five years, new figures show.

The number of assaults increased to 67,874 in 2014-15 from 54,758 assaults in 2008-9 – an increase of more than 13,000.

Doctors, nurses and other NHS workers were subjected to an average of 186 violent attacks every day, according to NHS Business Services Authority statistics, reported by the Daily Mirror.

The Royal College of Nursing’s senior employment relations advisor Kim Sunley told the newspaper: “Nobody should be assaulted or intimidated whilst going about their daily work.

“The figures are alarming and yet more evidence of the overwhelming pressures on the NHS.”

Over the last 10 years, the figures show that there have been almost 600,000 physical attacks on NHS staff.

However the number of assaults recorded in 2014-15 dropped slightly compared with the previous year, with 819 fewer assaults compared to 68,683 in 2013-14.

In the last year, there were 1,800 attacks on paramedics – an average of five attacks every 24 hours.

Doctors’ practices were the location for 1,600 assaults.

But the majority of attacks, 45,000, took place in mental health and learning disability centres.

_{Copyright (c) Press Association Ltd. 2016, All Rights Reserved. Pictured – Hospital security staff featured in the Channel 5 documentary – A&E: When Patients Attack – (c) Channel 5 / PA Wire.}