BRIDGETON — Several nurses on Tuesday spoke out about long-standing security concerns at the SSM Health DePaul Hospital emergency department following Monday’s stabbing that left two employees seriously injured.
Current and former DePaul nurses who spoke to the Post-Dispatch said hospital administrators have for years ignored their pleas to increase security at the Bridgeton facility by adding more guards and a metal detector to prevent physical assaults against medical staff by patients and visitors.
“This is something that we have been begging for help for, for years,” said one registered nurse at DePaul. She was one of several SSM Health nurses who spoke to the Post-Dispatch on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
SSM, a Catholic health system with 23 hospitals across four states, said in a statement that it takes the safety of its staff, patients and visitors seriously, and has a zero-tolerance policy for violence and aggression of any kind. The statement said the system is evaluating security measures at its emergency departments, and leadership is seeking input from staff to improve hospital safety.
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“Sadly, violence against health care workers is a national crisis impacting all hospitals and health systems,” the health system said in the statement.
Assaults
Nurses who spoke with the Post-Dispatch repeatedly said they weren’t surprised when they heard a patient had stabbed a nurse and a paramedic in the emergency department on Monday.
Prosecutors have charged the patient, Jimissa Rivers, with two counts of first-degree assault and two counts of armed criminal action. She remains in custody on a $2 million cash-only bail.
Current and former nursing staff at the hospital described frequent instances of physical and verbal violence at the hands of patients — including being punched, choked and sexually assaulted, and enduring threats to their and their families’ lives.
“(SSM) had all the warnings they could possibly need. This was 100% preventable,” said one SSM nurse who previously worked at DePaul. “When you’re working at DePaul you’re literally walking down the halls looking over your shoulder.”
The nurses said because of the lack of a security checkpoint upon entering the emergency unit, they are often in charge of confiscating weapons found on patients, particularly from those who are there for behavioral and mental health treatment.
Everyone who spoke to the Post-Dispatch said SSM’s response after an assault is to focus on the staff member’s actions.
“One of the first things they are going to ask the nurse and paramedic is ‘What could you have done better?’” said Samuel Shaefer, who left his position at the emergency room in October 2020 because of safety concerns. “They will reprimand the paramedic for getting involved and trying to help their colleague.”
“We had to put ourselves in harm’s way to protect each other,” he said of his time working in the emergency unit.
Several of the nurses spoke about their strained relationship with security guards, who are often stretched thin or do not respond in a timely manner. Guards often say they are not paid enough to perform some of their duties, nurses said.
Sara Marcello was the emergency room and trauma services director at DePaul from 2017 to 2020 and said she on several occasions asked the administration for more security and was turned down every time.
“At one point they told me if I didn’t stop bringing it up there would be a change in leadership,” she said.
A spokeswoman for SSM said Tuesday evening that she couldn’t immediately address Marcello’s complaints, but the health system takes such concerns seriously.
A national concern
Attacks on hospital workers have become a well-known problem in the U.S., and some health care workers say it has only gotten worse during the pandemic. Patients are often scared, intoxicated, injured, or experiencing mental health crises. Patients’ family members are often distressed and don’t understand that health care workers are stretched thin.
“We have seen a rise in violence as people become more and more frustrated with their disease state, and their lack of control over the pandemic,” said Jason Grellner, Mercy’s executive director of public safety. “And for some, it became a very political issue, an ideological issue.”
SSM said it follows national best practices on workplace violence policies and training. It has workplace violence committees at its hospitals, and on-site security and state-of-the-art video surveillance in its emergency departments.
“Metal detectors have not been standard at emergency rooms across the health care industry, but adoption rates are on the rise,” the statement said.
Area hospitals have been increasing precautions in response to the incidents.
The emergency departments at BJC HealthCare Barnes-Jewish Hospital and St. Louis Children’s Hospital both have metal detectors, a BJC spokeswoman said Tuesday. Behavioral health patients are checked for weapons when they arrive by ambulance. At some hospitals, BJC has started providing staff with emergency notification buttons — some wearable, some kept at nursing stations.
Grellner said there aren’t metal detectors at Mercy’s area hospitals, but the system will soon roll out a weapons detection system that it started using at Mercy Hospital Springfield two months ago.
It will be deployed at Mercy Hospital St. Louis within the next month, and soon will roll out across all Mercy emergency departments.
In the first six days of July, the artificial intelligence-based system intercepted five firearms and seven large, edged weapons, Grellner said, including a machete.
DePaul staff have set up a GoFundMe to raise money for the nurse and paramedic attacked on Monday.