Intimate Partner Violence/Abuse and Depressive Symptoms among Female Health Care Workers: Longitudinal Findings

Abstract

Intimate partner violence and abuse (IPV/A) have been shown to have a major impact on mental health functioning. This study assessed the longitudinal association between recent IPV/A and depressive symptoms in order to identify potential targets for preventive interventions for women. Random effects models were used to examine four waves of data collected at 6-month intervals from a cohort of 1438 female healthcare workers. Recent IPV/A (e.g., sexual and physical violence, psychological abuse) in the past 5 years was associated with higher CES-D 10 scores across 4 waves after adjustment for age, time, marital status, and childhood trauma. Women who reported IPV/A in the past 5 years had higher CES-D 10 scores (β 1.31, 95% CI .79-1.82, p<.0001) than non-abused women. This association was generally constant with time, suggestive of a cross-sectional association across all four waves of data. Additionally, recent IPV/A was associated with change in depressive symptoms over time among the full cohort and those with CES-D 10 scores below 10 (the threshold for likely depression) at baseline. Recent IPV/A was independently associated with depressive symptoms both cross-sectionally and longitudinally. The longitudinal association was stronger among those not depressed at baseline. Implications for healthcare settings and workplace policies addressing IPV/A are discussed.

Intimate Partner Violence and Incident Depressive Symptoms and Suicide Attempts: A Systematic Review of Longitudinal Studies

“…Three studies from the US [13],[26],[27] included adolescents and focused on dating violence; all of the other studies focused on IPV in adults. Four studies sampled participants from secondary schools [13],[22],[26],[27], four studies were individual or household surveys of the general population [20],[21],[23],[28], one was conducted at a college [29], one was conducted among hospital employees [30], and three sampled from a variety of venues [25],[31],[32]. The three remaining studies recruited pregnant women, two from hospitals [33],[34] and one from households in the general population [24].…”

“…Median attrition rate was 22.5% (interquartile range 17%–28.6%) (range 4.5% [31] to 57.1% [34]). Ten studies made use of two waves of data collection, two had three waves [23],[34], two had four waves [26],[30], one had five waves [33], and one had 14 [31]. The majority of studies included only female participants; the four studies that recruited from secondary schools also included males.…”

“…Nearly all (14 of 16) studies used measures of experience of specific acts of violence based in whole or in part on the Conflict Tactics Scale [35] or the World Health Organization instrument [24],[25]; one was based on the Abuse Assessment Screen [30] and one on the Severity of Violence Against Women Scales [33]. All of these instruments measure self-reported experience of specific acts of violence, for example, “Have you ever been slapped, punched, kicked, hit with an object”, and so on.…”

Conditions and Patterns of Intimate Partner Violence among Taiwanese Women

“…According to Domestic Violence Prevention Act in Taiwan, the definition of IPV refers to physical, psychological, or sexual violence. IPV has a negative impact on the mental and physical health of IPV survivors, as well as adverse societal influences and detrimental effects on the survivors' families and communities [6]; Glass et al, 2010; [7] Q2 . A British survey investigating the prevalence of domestic violence found that 23.5% of women aged more than 16 years have experienced domestic violence [8].…”

Understanding How Domestic Abuse Is Associated With Greater Depressive Symptoms in a Community Sample of Female Primary Care Patients

“…For example, Hathaway et al (2000) found women who had experienced domestic abuse from their partner in the past year were more than three times as likely as women who reported no domestic abuse to have developed depression. Importantly, in a large sample study of female workers, La Flair, Bradshaw, and Campbell (2012) found that abused females (e.g., experienced abuse from a partner), when compared with nonabused females, reported greater depressive experiences over an 18-month period, independent of initial depression. This finding suggests that domestic abuse may be an important causal determinant of later depressive experiences in females.…”