Violence in psychiatric units: a 7-year Italian study of persistently assaultive patients.

Background: The problem of violence and aggressive behaviour among patients with psychiatric disorders need careful assessment to improve the quality of psychiatric care. The aim of this paper is to describe the characteristics of repeated episodes of violence among patients admitted to an Italian psychiatric ward.

Methods: All violent behaviours, which occurred in a 15-bed psychiatric inpatient unit over a 7-year period, were assessed by using the Staff Observation Aggression scale (SOAS).