There has been a significant rise in reports of NHS staff being racially abused by patients, the BBC has found. Workers say they are being physically and verbally attacked because of their ethnicity more often than ever.

Nurse Tito Vicario says, in the two years he has worked at Sunderland Royal Hospital, he has been racially abused by patients multiple times.

"Whenever I feel like it's going to happen again I feel my heart racing," he says.

The abuse is often verbal but, in extreme cases, he says he has been physically attacked.

"There are times where some patients will try to punch you or slap you," he says.

"It affects you not just physically but mentally as well."

In one incident Vicario, who is originally from the Philippines, was on the receiving end of a highly offensive racial slur. The patient's mortified family immediately apologised but the damage had been done, Vicario says, and such experiences leave him feeling powerless, anxious and nervous.

On another occasion, he says he was racially abused by a female patient who refused to take medication from him.

"They try to say these things to release their anger and anxiety but we're not punching bags, we're still people," he says.

"You can't hit back, just smile.

"You just take it."

NHS staff face 'unprecedented' levels of racism from patients