Overview

Editors:

Anne McMurray
Peel Health Campus Chair in Nursing
Murdoch University, Mandurah, WA

Debra Jackson
School of Nursing, Family and Community Health
University of Western Sydney, NSW

Interpersonal violence is an insidious social problem that manifests itself in many different forms - including physical, sexual and emotional abuse as well as neglect.

Advances in Contemporary Nursing and Interpersonal Violence provides leading opinion pieces, reviews and new research perspectives on intimate partner violence and workplace violence, its impacts on nurses, their families and the community.

Industry standards recommend that all staff undertake compulsory training for dealing with potentially violent and aggressive situations, particularly in Mental Health (Victorian Dept of Human Services, Health and Community Services Union, Australian Nursing Federation & Victorian Healthcare Industry Association 2003).

It is to be hoped that through dissemination of knowledge in this issue that the power to arrest the insidious march of violence in nursing is generated.

Fiona Armstrong on behalf of the Australian Nursing Federation

This special issue redresses the inadequacy of current responses to violence in the workplace and current explanatory discourses of violence and aggression that serve to maintain the status quo. It is essential reading for policy, educators, nurses and other health professionals.

Table of Contents

Advances in Contemporary Nursing & Interpersonal Violence

Foreword: No Longer 'A Private Matter': Collective action against the manifestations of violence
Moira Carmody

Preface: Peace, Love and Equality: Nurses, interpersonal violence and social justice
Anne McMurray

Intimate Partner Violence

Opinion Piece: Screening for Domestic Violence: The evidence dilema
Joan Webster

Women Defining Themselves: Shared stories of of private hell
Elaine Dietsch

Lovestruck: Women, romantic love and intimate partner violence
Charmaine Power, Tina Koch, Debbie Kralik, Debra Jackson

Domestic Violence, Health and Health Care: Women's accounts of their experiences
Marion Tower, Anne McMurray, Jennifer Rowe, Marianne Wallis

Stories of Resistance and Healing in the Process of Leaving Abusive Relationships
Kierrynn Davis, Bev Taylor

Violence in the Nursing Workplace

Opinion Piece: Keeping Nurses Safe: An industry perspective
Fiona Armstrong

Violence, Zero Tolerance and the Subversion of Professional Practice
Colin Holmes

'They stand you in a corner; you are not to speak': Nurses tell of abuse indoctrination in work teams dominated by bullies
Marie Hutchinson, Margaret H Vickers, Debra Jackson, Lesley Wilkes

Workplace Violence: The dark side of organisational life
Sandra Speedy

Survival of the Fittest, or Socially Constructed Phenomena?: Theoretical understandings of aggression and violence towards nurses
Lauretta Luck, Debra Jackson

Contemporary Perspectives on Health and Violence

Opinion Piece: Aggression in Nursing: A time to look closely at aged care?
Katrina Cubit, Gerry Farrell

Alert But Not Alarmed?: The rhetoric of terrorism and life after 9/11
Kim Walker

Interpersonal Violence and Mental Illness: A literature review
Donna Gillies, Louise O'Brien

Working with Families Experiencing Violence: The Ploeger Model of Enhanced Maternal and Child Health Nursing Practice
Gay Edgecombe, Heather Ploeger

297 Child-to-Mother Violence: A Pilot Study
Michel Stewart, Lesley Wilkes, Debra Jackson, Judy Mannix

Nurses' Understanding of Domestic Violence
Kumiyo Inoue, Sue K Armitage

Epilogue

Recognising, Responding and Resisting Violence: A critical challenge for nurses
Debra Jackson, Anne McMurray

Reviews of Advances in Contemporary Nursing and Interpersonal Violence
Judy Lumby, Graeme Browne