Official figures show there were almost 55,000 physical assaults against NHS staff in England in 2008-09 – a 2.2% drop from the previous period.
The new figures from the NHS Security Management Service (NHS SMS) show there were 54,758 physical assaults reported during 2008-9 on NHS staff working in all care sectors.
There was a slight decrease of 1,235 reported assaults compared with the 55,993 assaults recorded during 2007-8.
Action was taken in some cases and there were 941 criminal sanctions applied in 2008-9 following cases of physical assault, but the number of sanctions applied actually fell from 992 applied in 2007-08.
All NHS trusts in England submitted annual figures for the number of reported physical assaults against NHS staff to the NHS SMS.
Most of the assaults took place in the mental health and learning disability sector where there were 38,958 assaults, followed by 11,088 in the acute sector, 3,472 in primary care (down from 3,607 in 2007-08) and 1,240 in the ambulance sector.
The NHS SMS said violence against NHS staff was unacceptable and urged staff to keep speaking out.
NHS SMS works in partnership with local security management specialists (LSMSs) to encourage all NHS staff to report physical assaults and support action against offenders.
LSMSs are in place in 90% of health bodies around England to investigate security breaches, along with the police, and implement new systems to protect NHS staff and property.
Managing director of the NHS Counter Fraud and Security Management Service, Dermid McCausland, said: “Many will welcome the reduction in reported assaults this year. But the NHS is not complacent. We have more work to do to let all NHS staff know they should not accept violence as part of their job.
“We continue to maintain our efforts to protect staff. November is Security Awareness Month across the NHS in England and I would encourage staff to work with their Local Security Management Specialist to raise any concerns they may have about the safety of their working environment.”
Head of the NHS SMS, Richard Hampton, said: “NHS staff must be able to deliver high quality clinical care in a safe and secure environment. We are supporting staff in this aim through a network of professionally trained local security management specialists.
“New legislation is also being introduced to tackle low level nuisance and disturbance behaviour, preventing situations escalating into something more serious.”
The Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 created a new criminal offence of causing a nuisance or disturbance on NHS premises and a power for authorised NHS staff to remove a person suspected of committing this offence. The legislation comes into effect at the end of this month.