They’re mostly women and overburdened at work – some enduring punches, groping and insults daily from the people they’re employed to help, researchers say.
Ontario long-term care workers rarely complain for fear of reprisal from their employers and amid an absence of hope anything will change, said Jim Brophy and Margaret Keith, authors of Breaking Point: Violence Against Long-Term Care Staff.
If workers do speak out, said the duo behind the recently self-published, peer-reviewed study, they’re told the physical and verbal abuse they suffer – and the mental pain it breeds – is just part of the job.
“The system is at a breaking point. … Staff are at a breaking point,” Brophy said