Characteristics of Gender-Based Violence Determined from Emergency Room Visits

Abstract

Gender-based violence is recognized as a public health problem worldwide. Nevertheless, in Italy, there are no official epidemiological studies about it. We therefore thought that it was important to conduct a study to describe and quantify the problem in Ferrara. This is one of the first systematic studies to be performed by a regional health service authority. The sample examined was taken from patients presenting to the emergency departments of the Sant'Anna University Hospital in the period from January 1, 2008, to December 31, 2013. The final sample comprised 1,359 patients. Data were collected and analyzed using the following software: (1) SAP, acronym for Systems, Applications and Products in data processing, a management software developed by SAP AG; (2) SAS, acronym for “statistical analysis system,” a set of integrated software products enabling work on the database and specific operations such as data input, search, and management; and (3) Excel. The total number of women patients exposed to violence was 1,359, constituting an average of 225 per year. Sixty-one percent of victims of violence and/or abuse were of Italian nationality, followed by women from Central and Eastern Europe, Nigeria, and Morocco. Percentages related to nationalities refer to the three-year period 2010–2013 since before then this indicator was not available. Therefore, the total number of patients was 897. Where violence was perpetrated by an intimate partner, in 98% of the cases the perpetrator was the husband/live-in partner, and in the remaining 2% of cases a boyfriend. Since most women in our sample came within the central age group, that is, aged between 26 and 45, women appear to be most exposed to violence and/or abuse in these years when the stabilization of intimate relationships usually takes place. Patients who experienced violence and/or abuse were mostly of Italian nationality. In our sample, husbands/live-in intimate partners are the main abusers.

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