Background: Workplace violence (WPV) had become an important issue that endangered the occupational safety of psychiatric nurses. A growing number of studies showed positive post-traumatic growth (PTG) resulting from coping with trauma.
Objective: To investigate the characteristics of PTG in psychiatric nurses who experienced violence in the workplace and analyze its influencing factors.
Methods: A total of 1202 psychiatric nurses participated in the study. From October 2022 to December 2022, this cross-sectional study collected data on psychiatric nurses from five tertiary hospitals in Guangdong Province, China. Twenty-item Chinese version post-traumatic growth inventory (PTGI), Jefferson Scale of Empathy Health Professional (JSE-HP), Confidence in Coping with Patient Aggression Instrument (CCPAI), Post-traumatic Stress Disorder Checklist-Civilian Version (PCL-C), and Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) measured PTG level, empathy, the confidence in coping with WPV, post-traumatic stress disorder, and resilience, respectively. Bivariate analysis and multiple linear regression explored potential influencing factors of PTG. This study complies with the EQUATOR (STROBE) checklist.
Results: The sample was composed of a total of 1202 psychiatric nurses suffering from WPV. The average score of PTGI in psychiatric nurses was above average (65.75 points; SD = 20.20). Linear regression analyses showed from single-child family (β=0.052,95% CI=0.342,5.409, P< 0.05), education background (β=0.108,95% CI=1.833,5.097, P< 0.001), the confidence in coping with patient aggression (β=0.106,95% CI=1.385,4.317, P< 0.001), empathy (β=0.057,95% CI=0.312,4.374, P< 0.05), and resilience (β=0.484,95% CI=7.737,9.575, P< 0.001) were associated with PTG level.
Conclusion: Psychiatric nurses who were non-single child, had received higher education, had confidence in coping with patient aggression, had good resilience and strong empathy were prone to PTG after experiencing WPV. The study findings could help hospitals and nursing managers identify vulnerable individuals and take early intervention measures against such populations.

Keywords: post-traumatic growth, psychiatric nurses, workplace violence, mental health