Today one of the hospital’s leading A&E consultants, Dr Bill Morrison, said it was a period when things could “go pear-shaped”.

He admitted his threshold of acceptable behaviour had lowered over the years.

Nowadays incidents that trouble patients visiting his department don’t even necessarily register trouble radar because he and his colleagues are so regularly exposed to abuse.

“Over the years my threshold for what is acceptable has probably changed,” said Dr Morrison.

“Patients do frequently say to me ‘You should not have to put up with that’.”

He said that fortunately aggressive attacks in his department were “rare” and the vast majority of abuse was verbal.

Meanwhile, NHS Tayside today released figures for assaults in the current year to the end of November.

The largest number of the 528 happened in Carseview (197), a unit for acutely mentally ill patients adjacent to Ninewells.

There were also 53 attacks on staff in Ninewells.

Dr Morrison said that in the festive period his department could also call on the uniformed security patrols if required.

Also, as in previous years, police officers would be on duty in the department.

“I would hope that, as in previous years, our preparation will prove to be not 100% necessary but we do regard it as a critical period.”

“We are prepared for anything the festive season throws at us, but experience in recent years suggests we would be surprised if we get anything which was terribly unpleasant or outrageous.”

Meanwhile, a Holyrood committee may investigate the level of attacks on health service in Scotland.

The move follows a survey by BBC Scotland which suggested more than 20,000 assaults, both verbal and physical, were carried out last year.

MSP Roseanna Cunningham, convener of the Scottish Parliament’s Health Committee, said she would raise the findings with Health Minister Andy Kerr.