Sociodemographic Characteristics of Pregnant Women Exposed to Domestic Violence During Pregnancy in an Iranian Setting

BACKGROUND: Domestic violence refers to any type of physical, sexual, and psychological abuse enforced in the setting of familial relationships. Domestic violence has a significant relationship with poor outcome among pregnant women. Success in resolving this social phenomenon rests on accurate assessment of the society and the factors associated with violence in that specific community. OBJECTIVES: The present study was conducted to assess the demographic characteristics of pregnant women exposed to different types of domestic violence during pregnancy in Iranian setting. PATIENTS AND METHODS: This is a descriptive-analytic, cross-sectional study. Sampling was done with convenience sampling method. in the current study, 301 pregnant women aged 15-45 years of Iranian nationality who were referred to the hospital for delivery or abortion, regardless of the gestational age, were selected as the subjects. Data collection tools consisted of a sociodemographic questionnaire and a violence checklist. Violence was assessed using Revised Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2). Data were analyzed using descriptive and analytic statistics on SPSS version 16 (SPSS, Chicago, IL, USA) and STATA version 10. The characteristics of the participants were presented as mean ± SD or number and percentage. Differences between variables were determined by the χ2 test, and multivariate logistic regression. P < 0.05 was considered significant. RESULTS: According to the findings, 34.56% of participants had experienced psychological violence, 28.24% physical violence, and 3.65% sexual violence. Multivariate logistic regression revealed a statistically significant relationship only in the case of physical violence and history of penal conviction for partner (Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR) = 12.60) and a patriarchal household (AOR = 16.75). CONCLUSIONS: As domestic violence is greatly influenced by the customs and cultures of each community, no single strategy can be adopted to resolve it universally. Simultaneously, it is necessary to adopt comprehensive measures to control factors associated with domestic violence in the healthcare, judiciary, and the educational systems in order to prevent and curb this social challenge.