<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><sec id="j_sjph-2017-0022_s_333_w2aab2b8c15b1b7b1aab1c16b1Aa"><h3>Background</h3><p>Domestic violence is recognized as a public health problem with a high prevalence in the general population. Healthcare professionals play an important role in the recognition and treatment of domestic violence. Hence, conducting research on factors that facilitate or inhibit appropriate actions by healthcare professionals is of the upmost importance. The objective of the study was to examine the relationship between healthcare professionals’ attitudes toward the acceptability of domestic violence and their responses when dealing with victims of domestic violence.</p></sec><sec id="j_sjph-2017-0022_s_334_w2aab2b8c15b1b7b1aab1c16b2Aa"><h3>Methods</h3><p>The sample consisted of 322 healthcare professionals (physicians, dentists, nursing staff and other healthcare workers; 85.2% female), who completed a questionnaire, assessing their attitudes towards domestic violence, experience, behaviour and perceived barriers in recognizing and treating domestic violence in the health care sector. The study was cross-sectional and used availability sampling.</p></sec><sec id="j_sjph-2017-0022_s_335_w2aab2b8c15b1b7b1aab1c16b3Aa"><h3>Results</h3><p>The results showed no significant differences in domestic violence acceptability attitudes when comparing groups of healthcare professionals who reported low or high frequency of domestic violence cases encounters. Furthermore, we found that domestic violence acceptability attitudes were negatively associated with action taking when the frequency of encounters with domestic violence cases was high and medium. However, the attitudes were not associated with action taking when the frequency of encounters with domestic violence cases was low.</p></sec><sec id="j_sjph-2017-0022_s_336_w2aab2b8c15b1b7b1aab1c16b4Aa"><h3>Conclusions</h3><p>The results highlight the important role of attitudes in action taking of healthcare professionals when it comes to domestic violence. This indicates the need for educational interventions that specifically target healthcare professionals’ attitudes towards domestic violence.</p></sec></abstract>

BackgroundDomestic violence is recognized as a public health problem with a high prevalence in the general population. Healthcare professionals play an important role in the recognition and treatment of domestic violence. Hence, conducting research on factors that facilitate or inhibit appropriate actions by healthcare professionals is of the upmost importance. The objective of the study was to examine the relationship between healthcare professionals’ attitudes toward the acceptability of domestic violence and their responses when dealing with victims of domestic violence.MethodsThe sample consisted of 322 healthcare professionals (physicians, dentists, nursing staff and other healthcare workers; 85.2% female), who completed a questionnaire, assessing their attitudes towards domestic violence, experience, behaviour and perceived barriers in recognizing and treating domestic violence in the health care sector. The study was cross-sectional and used availability sampling.ResultsThe results showed no significant differences in domestic violence acceptability attitudes when comparing groups of healthcare professionals who reported low or high frequency of domestic violence cases encounters. Furthermore, we found that domestic violence acceptability attitudes were negatively associated with action taking when the frequency of encounters with domestic violence cases was high and medium. However, the attitudes were not associated with action taking when the frequency of encounters with domestic violence cases was low.ConclusionsThe results highlight the important role of attitudes in action taking of healthcare professionals when it comes to domestic violence. This indicates the need for educational interventions that specifically target healthcare professionals’ attitudes towards domestic violence.

The role of attitudes to, and the frequency of, domestic violence encounters in the healthcare professionals’ handling of domestic violence cases

Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts

Slovenian Journal of Public Health

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

VLOGA STALIŠČ IN POGOSTOSTI SREČEVANJA Z NASILJEM V DRUŽINI PRI UKREPANJU ZDRAVSTVENEGA OSEBJA

BackgroundDomestic violence is recognized as a public health problem with a high prevalence in the general population. Healthcare professionals play an...

Predictor	ΔR²	B	95 % CI for B	β
Step 1	.09 p<.01;
Gender		.24	[- .03, .52]	.09
DV acceptability		- .36	[- .68, -.04]	12 p<.01;
attitudes
Frequency of DV cases		.30	[.19, .42]	.27 p<.001.
Step 2	.02 p<05
Gender		.26	[- .02, .53]	.09
DV acceptability		- .41	[- .67, - .04]	12 p<.01;
attitudes
Frequency of DV cases		.30	[.18, .41]	.26 p<.001.
Attitudes x frequency		- .46	[- .86, - .08]	- .13 p<05
interaction
R2	11 p<.01;

The role of attitudes to, and the frequency of, domestic violence encounters in the healthcare professionals’ handling of domestic violence cases

Article Category: Original scientific article

Published Online: May 26, 2017

Page range: 166 - 171

Received: Jul 05, 2016

Accepted: Mar 20, 2017

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/sjph-2017-0022

Keywords
domestic violence, attitudes, response, detection, health personnel

© National Institute of Public Health, Slovenia

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Figure 1

Results of hierarchical regression for action taking in domestic violence cases.

The role of attitudes to, and the frequency of, domestic violence encounters in the healthcare professionals’ handling of domestic violence cases

Article Category: Original scientific article

Published Online: May 26, 2017

Page range: 166 - 171

Received: Jul 05, 2016

Accepted: Mar 20, 2017

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/sjph-2017-0022

Keywordsdomestic violence, attitudes, response, detection, health personnel

© National Institute of Public Health, Slovenia

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Figure 1

Results of hierarchical regression for action taking in domestic violence cases.

Keywords
domestic violence, attitudes, response, detection, health personnel