Every health care provider needs to know that Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) poses a significant health risk to the physical health of women. It crosses all socioeconomic, cultural, racial, and religious lines. One-third to one-half of all women will experience IPV in their lifetime. Survivors of IPV are disproportionately frequent users of health care services because of physical, emotional, or behavioral effects of the IPV.

This growing national concern carries with it several implications for health care providers. Screening is one of these major concerns. Screening is the first step toward helping women who experience violence in their lives. Because health care providers often care for survivors of violence, they must be aware of assessment methods and interventions that will interrupt the cycle of violence.

Since 1992, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) has mandated hospitals have policies on screening for IPV. However, adoption of policies doesn’t always translate into universal screening. Without system support, screening is very difficult to accomplish.

It’s important to address IPV in health care because health care providers are sometimes the first contact—or the only contact—the IPV victim may see. If health care providers haven’t been taught the words to say in order to screen, those words won’t magically come out of their mouths.

Many times, health care providers are reluctant to screen because they don’t feel comfortable asking. However, in health care, we screen for other very personal issues, such as drinking, smoking, sexually transmitted diseases, etc. We as professionals must become comfortable screening for IPV. A woman’s personal safety may be in jeopardy or her life may be at stake.

The American Nurses Association’s (ANA) position statement supports the education of nurses in assessment skills, interventions, and prevention of physical violence against women in order to promote universal screening for IPV. For health care providers to understand the importance of screening, they must be taught the words, the body language, and screening measures to use.

It’s important to screen all individuals for IPV—not just the ones you suspect or the ones who are obvious because of physical injuries. There are no pre-existing characteristics of abusers or survivors of IPV. This is one very important reason to screen everyone.

Screening also helps IPV survivors get referrals to appropriate services sooner, aids physicians in quicker and more accurate diagnoses, and very importantly communicates a broader societal message that IPV isn’t acceptable.

Early recognition of IPV reduces disease and death and decreases the length of time children watch IPV.

Because of the general lack of education and clinical preparation in IPV, there’s a current need to update facilities through workshops and in-services so health care providers feel comfortable with IPV content, with questions they may be asked, and how to reply if the patient responds positively to any of the questions about IPV such as “has a recent, past, or current partner ever caused you to be afraid or has a recent, past, or current partner every physically hurt you?”.

Health care providers need to know they don’t have to handle the situation alone, once IPV has been disclosed. They can call the Center for Prevention of Abuse at 1-800-559-7233, and a patient advocate will come to the hospital at any time to inform the IPV survivor of his or her resources, options, etc. TPW