The proportion of NHS staff who have been attacked at work is at a three-year high, a survey has revealed.
The poll of 766,000 NHS staff in England showed some 14.47% reported at least one incident of violence from patients or other members of the public in the past 12 months – the highest figure since 2022.
More than a quarter of workers also experienced harassment, bullying or abuse in the same period, the survey showed, up slightly from 2024.
And almost one in 10 said they had been the target of unwanted sexual behaviour from patients; the highest figure recorded in the three years staff have been asked about this.
Roughly 3.5% said they had faced such behaviour from colleagues, but this figure was the lowest in three years.
Discrimination from patients or other members of the public was reported by nearly one in 10, a slight increase on last year and the highest number on record.
And nearly 9% said they had faced discrimination from managers, team leaders or colleagues, but this was down slightly on 2024.
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Danny Mortimer, director general (people) for NHS England, said: “These figures paint a deeply worrying picture of the abuse our hardworking NHS staff face.
“Staff safety and well-being is paramount, and we want everyone experiencing any kind of unwanted incident to feel confident enough to report it.
“But while that behaviour is completely unacceptable, we must look at what more we can do to support the people who keep our services running.”
The survey further revealed that the proportion of staff who feel secure raising concerns about unsafe clinical practice had hit a five-year low of 71.1%.
Correspondingly, little more than half – about 55% – said they feel confident that their organisation would address their concerns, again the lowest proportion in five years.
Fewer than half of staff, 46.51%, said they could to meet all the conflicting demands on their time at work.
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And not even a third – 32.8% – said their organisation had enough staffing for them to do their job properly.
Both figures represent a slight decrease on last year.
And just 62.84% said they would be happy with the standard of care if their friend or a relative was a patient.
