Many such patients are habitually abusive and make it very difficult for the medical staff to deal with them during their general practice. When the staff is forced to handle them, it puts several mental pressures on the staff. To manage the behavior of the patients, a strategy of writing a kind of warning letter to patients has been introduced. This strategy is effective in most situations. However, the hospital is required to show consistency when it comes to dealing with patients who violate the zero-tolerance policy of the hospital.
What is a zero-tolerance letter?
Patients admitted in hospitals often get so aggressive that their start unnerving people particularly staff of the hospital with their abusive behavior. The staff is responsible for handling such patients to some extent. However, when things go out of control and when the patient seems to torture others deliberately, the hospital has a right to take strict actions.
What is a zero-tolerance letter to the patient?
It is a communication between medical authorities and patients in which patients are informed about the fact that the hospital will not tolerate their abusive behavior. Every hospital has a zero-tolerance policy according to which, the bad and offensive behavior of the patient will not be tolerated.
Why write a zero-tolerance letter to the patient?
The staff of the hospital is valuable and the safety of every person working in the staff is one of the top priorities of the hospital. When the hospital enforces such policies that ensure the safety of the staff, the work environment is kept safe and pleasant. Patients in the hospital should be informed about this policy so that they also show adherence to these policies and behave well. The letter of zero tolerance lets everyone know about this policy and also asks everyone to show compliance.
What is the benefit of writing this letter?
Key benefits of writing this letter are:
It helps in handling patients:
It has been seen that most of the patients don’t exhibit abusive behavior. A handful of habitually abusive patients can be corrected easily with this letter. The first step is to identify such patients who act offensively and then their behavior can be monitored to see the impact of this letter on them.
It enforces respect of GP:
General practitioner, like any other professional person, deserves respect and appreciation. Unfortunately, there are a few people who don’t respect their doctors and show disrespect towards them. The zero-tolerance letter compels them to respect the general practitioner.
It maintains discipline:
When every patient in the hospital is told that the hospital will not tolerate any kind of violation of the law and abusive attitude, they tend to behave well. The management of the hospital in this letter tells what might be the outcomes of the violation of the hospital’s rules. This eventually lets everyone show compliance with the policies.
Below is a sample letter that will help you draft a zero-tolerance letter to patients:
Sample letter -1
It is being notified that ABC Hospital enforces the policy of ‘’zero tolerance’’ according to which, the aggressive behavior of patients towards healthcare providers will not be tolerated at any cost. It is a great honor for ABC Hospital to have all the patients who have trusted the hospital and its services. 90% of the patients behave well and respect the doctors. However, for the past few months, we have been receiving plenty of complaints regarding the abusive behavior of patients towards their general practitioners.
We would like to inform you that the hospital will not accept this kind of behavior of the patient. Everyone is entitled to give feedback and reviews regarding the medical services the hospital provides. However, no one is allowed to take the law in hands and express their opinion by being rude and offensive.
The examples of behavior that will not be accepted include:
- Physical violence on the doctor
- Abusing doctor with foul language
- Sexually abusing a male or female staff member
- Shouting or beating any GP
- Going racist towards any general practitioner
Regards,
Signatures
File: MS Word Max. Size: 14 KB
Sample Letter -2
Dear Patient
(Name of your organization) has a “zero-tolerance” policy concerning episodes of aggressive behavior towards our staff.
We regard it as a privilege to provide healthcare services to the population. We have recently experienced unacceptable behavior towards our staff. This is something that we cannot tolerate. We are not meaning frustration or complaints that you may have concerning our services, as everyone has a right to express their views.
Unacceptable behavior includes (state this in bullet points).
You can check out our policy on our website (give address).
A summary of this is (state this here). If any line is crossed, we will act on this accordingly. (Tell what action will be taken).
Name of doctor
Date
File: MS Word Max. Size: 19 KB
