Hospital staff facing verbal abuse 'on daily basis'

A woman who runs an emergency department says hospital staff are facing verbal abuse "on a daily basis".

Sarah McKay, who works as a senior sister on the emergency department at the John Radcliffe Hospital, said staff have seen an increase in racial, sexual and homophobic abuse, as well as physical assaults.

It comes as Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (OUH) has partnered with Thames Valley Police to bring a scheme known as Operation Cavell to its hospitals across the county.

The campaign will see the local NHS Trust, police force and the Crown Prosecution Service come together to "strengthen protections for NHS staff, improve conviction rates and support victims".

McKay, 48, said the abuse is "getting worse" and makes her feel "broken".

National data shows a rising trend for violence and abuse against healthcare workers, with one in seven reporting physical violence from patients, relatives or the public in 2024.

OUH data shows the number of incidents recorded by the trust yearly from 2021 to 2026 have increased, which it said reflected a "significant change" in reporting, as well as the incidents themselves.

It said the incidents reported by its own staff on the trust's reporting system cover verbal abuse, physical assault, and racial and sexual harassment, and include incidents involving patients, relatives and visitors.

McKay said the majority of abuse is verbal, which she finds "extremely upsetting and demoralising".

"I spend a lot of my shift being called all sorts of despicable names, having my parenting questioned, having threats made against me, have been told that they hope I die, they hope I get cancer, and these are all things that have been said to me by patients in the last six months," she said.

She said abuse affects the patients and relatives that witness it as well as the staff.

She added: "People don't want to do the job anymore."

The trust said the co-ordinated approach of Operation Cavell was designed to send a clear message that violence and abuse against OUH staff was taken seriously, and should not be tolerated as "part of the job".

McKay described the scheme as "really positive", adding: "It's going to encourage the entire hospital, that we're going to have a quicker way of escalating our concerns, making sure that cases are dealt with, having it taken really seriously as a whole and a more streamlined approach to being able to report it."