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Harassment at Work
My question involves labor and employment law for the state of: PA
I work in a private prison. I am an RN who is being harassed by a contracted physician. The first two incidents happened on June 11 and July 30 of this year. I was doing my job, and trying to get the physician to sign a consent form with the patient for a surgical procedure. He started yelling at me and accusing me of doing things that did not happen. He continued to yell and act inappropriately to me for no reason. I had many witnesses and after both incidents, I wrote him up and sent a copy of the files to my supervisor. Both the warden and HR at the facility are aware of the incidents and both assured me that it would not happen again. They stated his contract would be terminated. This physician continued to attempt to intimidate me by standing over me at the counter (when no one was around) and stare at me. He also continued to harass me by bringing charts to me and asking me questions for which I had no answer to, as the information was from other nurses. Just this past Wednesday, the physician again started verbally degrading me and yelling at me because I notified him of a patient's status. He does not do this to any other nurse in the facility. On two occasions, including this past one, my direct supervisor was standing beside me and witnessed the events. He has also written the physician up for these actions. My question is, do I have a suit to file? I have given the facility plenty of time to correct the first two incidents, and I tried to continue working as normal, but I have to work with this physician,...it is my job. Is the company liable because they have not ensured that these incidents would not happen again? Any information would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you.
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Re: Harassment at Work
Nothing you have posted constitutes illegal harassment.
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Re: Harassment at Work
What about a hostile work environment? This man singles me out of the entire group. I cannot work with him. My job is to treat the patients and any concerns with the patients must be reported to him. Every time I approach him to discuss a patient status, he argues with me over nothing about the patient, constantly saying "where did you get your medical license" I have attempted multiple times to tell him that I am only reporting the patient's status, but he continually yells and hauls me into the patient's room to show me that I am wrong. When he finds that I am right about the patient's status, he only gets angrier at me. What really bugs me is that my supervisor has been a witness to these events and says nothing to the physician. He does, however, write a document stating events that occurred. It is difficult to explain on this site, as I have all of the write-ups submitted to my supervisor, but cannot post them.
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Re: Harassment at Work
A hostile work environment does not mean that people are hostile.
It means that you are suffering from specifically mentioned activities because and only because of your inclusion or exclusion from a specifically named group (sex, national origin, race, etc.) or in direct violation of public policy (whistle blower).
There is no protection from a coworker that is a jerk.
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Re: Harassment at Work
Unless you are being subjected to either sexual harassment or illegal discrimination under Title VII (race, national origin, religion etc.) you are not in a hostile work environment as defined by law.
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Re: Harassment at Work