La Trobe

Physical and mental health of women exposed to intimate partner violence in the 10 years after having their first child: An Australian prospective cohort study of first-time mothers

journal contribution
posted on 2021-01-19, 23:40 authored by SJ Brown, LJ Conway, KM Fitzpatrick, K Hegarty, FK Mensah, S Papadopoullos, H Woolhouse, Rebecca Giallo, D Gartland
Objective To investigate mental and physical health of mothers exposed to recent and early postpartum intimate partner violence (IPV) in the 10 years after having their first child. Design Prospective pregnancy cohort study. Setting Women were recruited at six metropolitan public maternity hospitals in Melbourne, Australia and followed up at 1, 4 and 10 years post partum. Study measures Exposure to physical and/or emotional IPV was measured using the Composite Abuse Scale at 1, 4 and 10 years. At 10-year follow-up, mothers reported on physical and mental health, and functional health status. Participants 1507 first-time mothers enrolled at mean of 15 weeks' gestation. Results One in three women experienced IPV during the 10 years after having their first child. Women experiencing recent IPV (19.1%) reported worse physical and mental health than women not reporting IPV. Compared with women not reporting IPV, women experiencing recent IPV had higher odds of poor functional health status (Adj OR=4.5, 95% CI 3.2 to 6.3), back pain (Adj OR=2.0, 95% CI 1.4 to 2.9), incontinence (Adj OR=1.8, 95% CI 1.2 to 2.6), depressive symptoms (Adj OR=4.9, 95% CI 3.2 to 7.5), anxiety (Adj OR=5.1, 95% CI 3.0 to 8.6) and post-traumatic stress symptoms (Adj OR=7.2, 95% CI 4.6 to 11.1) at 10 years. Women with past IPV at 1 and/or 4 years (15.7% of the cohort) also had higher odds of physical and mental health problems. There was evidence of a gradient in health outcomes by recency of exposure to IPV. Conclusions Both recent and past exposure to IPV are associated with poor maternal physical and mental health 10 years after a first birth. Health services and advocacy organisations providing support to women need to be aware of the consistent relationship between IPV and a range of physical and mental health conditions, which may persist even after IPV appears to have ceased.

History

Publication Date

2020-12-21

Journal

BMJ Open

Volume

10

Issue

12

Article Number

e040891

Pagination

11p.

Publisher

BMJ

ISSN

2044-6055

Rights Statement

The Author reserves all moral rights over the deposited text and must be credited if any re-use occurs. Documents deposited in OPAL are the Open Access versions of outputs published elsewhere. Changes resulting from the publishing process may therefore not be reflected in this document. The final published version may be obtained via the publisher’s DOI. Please note that additional copyright and access restrictions may apply to the published version.

Usage metrics

    Journal Articles

    Categories

    No categories selected

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC