“My mummy is a doctor – please keep her safe at work”, eight-year-old Faye Michie is pleading with the region of Teesside to stop violent attacks against staff in hospitals.
Her mum, Louise Michie works for University Hospitals Tees which encompasses South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust, who reported a 32% increase in attacks in the last 12 months.
839 members of staff from across the two trusts experienced some form of assault from patients, relatives or the public whilst carrying out their duties.
The hospital group has launched a violence against staff campaign featuring emotive messages from the children and grandchildren of its staff on posters, social media and a range of other channels.
The zero-tolerance campaign showcases images of the children in a diverse range of job roles including radiographers, security officers, pharmacy technicians, surgeons, nurses and midwives.
The group hopes the campaign will help to reduce the number of attacks in their hospitals.
“All NHS staff have the right to feel safe at work”
Louise Michie, consultant obstetrician for South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust was extremely eager for her daughter Faye and son, Logan aged 10 to take part in the campaign.
She said: “All NHS workers have the right to feel safe at work to allow them to provide the best possible care to our patients.
“The campaign is incredibly important as it highlights the message that violent attacks against our staff will not be tolerated.”
Carley Wilson, scrub nurse at North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust didn’t think twice about involving her daughters Isla, aged 11 and Nevaeh, aged eight in the hard-hitting campaign.
She said: “This campaign is very important to me. I have been a nurse for 15 years now and love doing my job and helping patients.
“It is not appropriate to receive violence and aggression when we are here to help people.”
Rachael Metcalf, group chief people officer for University Hospitals Tees spoke about the ambition and reach of the campaign. She said: “This campaign really highlights how our workforce feel, through real voices.
“When we issued the casting call to our 15,000 staff, we were overjoyed to receive such a depth of representation in job roles, representing our diverse workforce right across the group.
“Importantly this project is ultimately about sending the message, no matter the role or the person violence and aggression to our staff is never acceptable”.