Hospital cited for inadequate protections against workplace violence
Health care workers at the facility were subjected to more than 500 incidents of violence during a seven-month period, OSHA contends.
A federal administrative law judge ruled that behavioral health facility Fuller Hospital repeatedly failed to protect its employees from incidents of violence, according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). The facility was initially cited in 2019, but had contested it.
The Attleboro, Mass., facility is operated by UHS of Delaware Inc. (USH-DE) and UHS of Fuller Inc. UHS of Delaware Inc. is owned by Universal Health Services, one of the nation’s largest behavioral health care service providers with at least 330 facilities nationwide, OSHA reported.
Employee complaints prompted the OSHA inspection, which found the hospital lacked safeguards to protect staff. As a result, more than 500 incidents of aggression happened at the hospital during a seven-month period, according to OSHA. Employees were reportedly kicked, punched, slapped, bitten and had hair ripped out, while certain staff members also suffered repeated concussions.
During a two-week trial in July and August 2022, employees testified about injuries sustained on the job, unsafe working conditions and insufficient training and staffing, OSHA reported.
At a January 2023 hearing, an administrative law judge affirmed OSHA’s citation and ruled that the two companies operated the facility as a single employer.
The judge also approved OSHA’s abatement measures, finding them both feasible and having the ability to reduce workplace violence. The measures include ensuring staffing levels are adequate to manage behavioral health emergencies, providing employees with personal panic alarms, improving training for new employees, conducting debriefings and investigations after an incident and having trained security personnel on duty during all three shifts of operation.
According to Galen Blanton, an OSHA regional administrator in Boston, around two million American workers are victims of on-the-job violence each year.
“OSHA requires employers to provide a safe and healthful workplace for all workers covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Act,” Blanton said in a release. “Employers who do not take all feasible steps to prevent or abate a recognized violence hazard in their workplace can be cited and fined.”
Destroying the evidence
In addition, both companies were sanctioned for destroying surveillance videos that showed employees being harmed, and USH-DE was sanctioned for failing to comply with discovery obligations. The companies were ordered to pay $20,175 in Labor Department legal fees as a result.
The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts previously ordered the companies to pay the department $30,515 in attorneys’ fees for failing to comply with a subpoena issued by OSHA for the surveillance videos.
“Like any other employer, industry leaders like UHS of Delaware Inc. must comply with the law. When employers do not adequately protect their workers from workplace violence, the U.S. Department of Labor will use all legal tools at our disposal to make them do so,” Regional Solicitor of Labor Maia Fisher in Boston,” said in a release. “When companies attempt to avoid liability by destroying evidence or keeping it from the department — as they did in this case — we will hold them accountable.”
The companies have appealed the trial decision to the full OSHA Review Commission.
Related: