WORKERS are more likely to face injury, bullying and abuse in Weston General Hospital than in most other trusts around the country, a survey has revealed. Key findings from the latest survey by independent watchdog the Healthcare Commission of 444 staff s

WORKERS are more likely to face injury, bullying and abuse in Weston General Hospital than in most other trusts around the country, a survey has revealed.Key findings from the latest survey by independent watchdog the Healthcare Commission of 444 staff show some depressing facts.In 2005, Weston was among the worst 20 per cent of trusts in England for:* Violence - nearly one in five staff were attacked by patients or their relatives.* Pressure - Weston is one of the worst trusts for staff feeling they have more work than they can cope with.* Bullying - Over a quarter of staff were harassed, bullied or abused by patients or relatives and one in five were abused by other staff members.Other findings include:* Errors - One in two staff members spotted a potentially harmful mistake or near miss every month, with 88 per cent going on to report such mistakes.* Falling morale - there was a significant decrease in 'positive feeling within the hospital' and 'job satisfaction'. * Training - The hospital was bad at appraising staff and providing structured appraisal reviews. But it made significant improvements in providing training, putting it into the best 20 per cent of English trusts in this category.There were also excellent scores in the team working, supervision, communication and staff involvement category, health and safety training and availability of hand washing materials categories.North Somerset Keep our NHS Public campaign spokesman, Kelvin Fraser, said: "This survey shows the reality of the situation for hard pressed local NHS staff."Clearly their working conditions are deteriorating and the ever-increasing demands being made upon them are bound to take a heavy toll, not only on staff themselves but on the patients they care for.Hospital chief executive, Mark Gritten, said: "We are obviously fully aware of staff concerns about violence and we responded to this during 2005 by reaffirming our action plan for minimising violence."We also worked with workplace bullying experts to train our own team of bullying and harassment advisors to help staff who report being bullied.