Can anything be done about this or is it 'just one of those things'

[OrmIrian]

DH rang me at work to say he has had to go to A&E as he thinks he might have broken his thumb when he had to defend himself from a chair used as a weapon. He is a teacher in a school for kids with EBD. He gets things chucked at him, he gets spat at, punched and bitten regularly. And when the pupils go for each other he has to intervene. When you know the sort of lives that some of these poor kids have and the problems they are dealing with it's hard to be angry with them. DH isn't.

But he is currently undergoing physio for a long-standing hamstring injury that has been exacerbated by a restraint he had to do. He has also been kicked there. It is causing him intense pain and he isn't sleeping. He has a big bruise on his upper arm from a bite last week.

He has had training in safe restraint techniques but that only goes so far.

It is largely down to one very troubled child. And DH knows why he's being so difficult atm.

Question is, is there anything that can be done to prevent some of this? Should his employers be doing it, if so?

firstly, i hope your DH is now home safe and well.

Yes there is things he can do, the employer can do etc. However, I can only share what would happen if this was in a health setting and not an educational setting. Although, i have a little knowledge of education (governor in school implementing team teach) so will share that too.

Any employee of ours that has either been injured through physical intervention (PI) or has a condition that is excaberated by PI (short or long term) would automatically be reviewed by occupational health and our PI team. The PI team will complete a health questionnaire and if they come across anything that would be made worse through PI then they will refer to OCC Health. Ultimately a risk assessment is drawn up between the employee, their line manager and the PI team in regards what they can do safely and what they can't. Obviously, resources have to be explored and it might be that (in health) certain shifts may not be achieved i.e. lone working. In some cases where PI is required daily and the employee is at high risk of injury then they are moved to another service. (we're talking 3 to 4 staff working on a 6-8 bed ward if comparing to aclassroom setting)

Has your DH been to Occ Health? Had discussions with the PI trainers?

If we have persistent issue with a specific client where the techniques we are using are causing more harm than good (for all) then we refer the whole scenarios back to the PI team and ask for suggestions. It might just be a team review of a specific technique or it might be introducing a new technique.

Our PI team also receive a copy of every incident requiring PI - they review these and question outcomes etc, offer support, advice if needed. They generally pick up issues before I would.

For the child (and what I have seen in our school - its mainstream) is that the safeguarding team (governor level and county level) would be involved with all situations being reported. risk assessments and management plans that clearly state how staff intervene and what techniques etc they can use. This would also be clearly stated within the individual behaviour plan. Again, we have a recent situation where the trainers are coming back in to do some specific training aimed at one specific child.

Are there RA's in place? Is there an IBP? when were they reviewed, do they need addressing now.

Training - when did DH have an update on his training? if he's using PI regularly than an annual review is necessary.

this might be all waffle but I hope there's a glimmer of something that might be helpful.

I work in Oc Health, like twinklytoes I worked in the health setting and we where involved with the Control and restraint training and employees after violent incidents, but not been in the NHS for 4 years so I am assuming that PI is the new name??
we worked v closely with the CR Trainers and advised on return to work following illness and injury, and Risk assessments constantly being reviewed, obviously H and S did that bit.
I was always impressed at all the staff, their love for the job and unbelievably low rates of stress compared to other areas, that said people left pretty quick if it didn't suit them :)
our biggest problem was non reporting, I remember the day we found out about staff in a hostage situation because a manager wanted to know what to do about the lack of sick notes from 1 of the staff because they were still in hospital recovering from their injuries a month later!! police had been involved they had been trapped with the client for hours, not a dickie bird on incident form filled out, so completely of our, H and S, and CRT radar!

From experience in education (privately run, teens with autism) you're pretty much expected to suck it up. Pregnant friends, while somewhat shielded by colleagues, have still been expected to deal with violent and aggressive students.

Your DH and the staff need to look at the cycle of this student's behaviour and the strategies that are used to manage them. That might be 1:1 working with a staff change every 15-20 minutes; or medication (not my favourite but effective short term while the therapy kicks in); or regular exercise breaks; or Emotional Literacy work... Depends on the student.

Does DH or another member of staff carry out some form of Life Space Interview (terminology might be different by now, I'm out of date!) where they talk through with the student what has happened and what could have been done differently.

Also, does DH think that the student's behaviour is improving? Is the frequency of outbursts decreasing, is the student more able to express themself...

Thankyou.

I suspect 'underreporting' is fairly standard. The staff tend to just accept it - a major restraint will result in form-filling but lessers incidnets just go by. Problem is that a lot of these children are fairly much at the end of the road . The school is the only calm and positive place in any of their lives and as they DH's class is Yr 11 they know they will be out come September. SOme of them have nowhere to go -their problems are such no college will accept them- they aren't with their families any more- they have almost zero hope of work. Hence the increased levels of stress and anger.A lot of them have no coherent way of expressing or understanding their reactions. Debriefs tend to consist of tears and "I'm sorry Mr W".

I had a long talk with DH last night. He was really upset for the children. He can cope with the injuries - the kids haunt him. but he can't see any way of stopping it happening as thing are. It's shit. For everyone.

He loves his job. But it distresses him so much I don't know how long he can carry on.

Debriefs tend to consist of tears and "I'm sorry Mr W"

Frankly, that's not good enough. Not from your DH, from management. The LSI is a vital part of an incident, so that everyone involved can work out how not to let it happen again and to rebuild relationships. Link here Your DH should have received training (Team Teach, TCI, whatever) in crisis management, which includes the use of physical restraint as a last resort. IME, the physical stuff is about 20% of the time spent training, and that includes a lot of practising; content wise it's about 5%

No wonder people are getting injured. Nothing is being done to help these kids effectively manage their behaviour, therefore they are repeating the same stuff over and over. Nor is anyone taking the time afterwards to make sure that they are emotionally stable again - take one angry, mixed up teen who has just injured the only person they can respect (that's your DH). That makes for a pretty fucked up headspace imo!

Who's definition of insanity was repeating the same action in the perpetual hope that it would have a different outcome?

PS this is a generalised rant, not intended to cause any offence or upset to you or your dh. Hopefully I've included enough decent information to be of some use

ANY employer has a duty of care! Ensure he fills an accident form in and reports it as an accident. Raise with H&S representative.

Good Luck x

pidj - the problem is lack of time and resources. He has a class to teach and other children to care for. There is a limited amt of time available to 'debrief'. He already stays last most nights of the week filling in incident forms. Yesterday 2 of them kicked off. And the day before he was called to intervene in another class - problem he is a big, strong man so it is assumed he will be OK. He might be OK physically but emotionally he is a mess right now.