Improving the Health Care Response to Domestic Violence
in Vermont:

Resource Page for Health Care
Practitioners and Administrators

I’ve had black eyes, fractured ribs, he’s literally stepped on my head, knocked me out. But it’s amazing what just stress can do to your body, I never would have thought of it. I dropped down to 89 pounds, lost most of my hair. And had a nervous breakdown that got me hospitalized for 2 weeks. Julie, Survivor of Intimate Partner Violence (Excerpt from the Video “Voices of Survivors and Perpetrators” in the Vermont Curriculum on Intimate Partner Violence for Health Care Providers)

The Initiative

The Vermont Leadership Team on Health Care and Intimate Partner Violence was created in 2001 with the mission of improving the health care response to intimate partner violence in Vermont. The team’s statewide plan maps out paths toward fulfilling this mission

This resource website is one of the ways in which the team is providing support to Vermont health care practitioners and administrators who are trying to enhance their response to victims and survivors of intimate partner violence. It includes clinical guidelines, downloadable tools and forms, and links to some of the best statewide and national resources. Other new resources include the Vermont Curriculum on Intimate Partner Violence for Health Care Providers.

The Issue

Domestic Violence or Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is a pattern of assaultive and coercive behaviors that may include inflicted physical injury, psychological abuse, sexual assault, progressive social isolation, stalking, deprivation, intimidation and threats. These behaviors are perpetrated by someone who is, was, or wishes to be involved in an intimate or dating relationship with an adult or adolescent, and are aimed at establishing control by one partner over the other.

Although Sexual Violence can be perpetrated by a stranger, it is often used by an abuser against his or her intimate partner. A health care response to sexual violence may involve unique legal and treatment approaches, therefore information on this issue appears in a separate Sexual Violence section.

Prevalence

Domestic violence is a public health problem of epidemic proportions in Vermont and throughout the country. Nearly one-third of American women report being physically or sexually abused by a husband or boyfriend at some point in their lives. The rates of abuse among adolescents and within Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual/Transgender communities are similarly high. The Vermont Fatality Review Commission found that more than half of the 126 homicides committed in Vermont in the past decade were related to domestic violence. Our state experienced a 19% increase in rapes and a 10% rise in aggravated physical assaults between 2002-3. During the same year, Vermont domestic and sexual violence programs served 8046 victims.
Click here for more statistics.
 

Impact on Health and Health Care

The health effects of domestic violence are staggering. In addition to the immediate trauma and injuries caused by abuse, domestic violence contributes to a number of chronic health problems (such as migraines, ulcers, back pain, pelvic pain and STIs) and interferes with the management of other illnesses. Medical studies link long-term effects of domestic violence with a myriad of health problems including smoking, diabetes, obesity, eating disorders and substance abuse.  Click here for more signs and symptoms and information about screening”.

The Role of Health Care Practitioners and Health Systems

Health care practitioner are in a unique position to help victims of abuse, if they know how to detect domestic violence and provide victims with assessments, referrals and support.  Click here for more information about Clinical Guidelines. Clinicians are often the first, and sometimes the only, outsiders who witness the effects of violence. But, too often, health care practitioners do not discuss abuse with their patients or screen patients for domestic violence. Fewer than ten percent of primary care physicians routinely screen patients for domestic violence during regular office visits, according to a study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1999. To support their staff in this effort, health care organizations can take important administrative steps to ensure an effective health care response to IPV.

Number of Visitors

  Hosted by the Vermont Medical Society