Introduction

Violence at work is defined as an action, incident, or behavior with a voluntary attitude of the aggressor, as a result of which a professional is assaulted, threatened, or suffers some damage during the performance of their work. The nursing team is exposed daily to situations of violence at work.

Objective

To understand and analyze the mechanisms of coping with violence used by nursing professionals in the hospital context and Primary Health Care.

Materials and Method

A mixed sequential explanatory study, with 198 nursing workers from a hospital and 169 from Primary Health Care, in a municipality in southern Brazil. The data were collected using a survey in the quantitative stage and interviews in the qualitative one analyzed through the software Statistical Package for the Social Sciences and by the thematic analysis.

Results

It was identified that 51% of the participants were victims of violence, and the coping mechanisms used by the workers are individual and collective, with a predominance of the first, showing that the problem is often directed at the victim. Collective work was a contributing factor in tackling violence, with emphasis on dialogue and support among the team. However, there was no institutional support in the search for conduct in the face of episodes of violence and consequences for perpetrators.

Conclusion

The prevalence of violence was high in both scenarios, with different characteristics regarding the profile of victims and perpetrators. The importance of collective coping is reinforced, as the most effective way to combat violence in the workplace.

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