Domestic violence and sexual abuse in women physicians: Associated medical, psychiatric, and professional difficulties

Physicians have been called on to identify victims of domestic violence (DV ) and sexual abuse (SA). Few data exist, however, on the prevalence of DV a nd SA in physicians themselves or on the personal or professional sequelae of such experiences. We determined the reported lifetime prevalence of DV a nd SA among women physicians and the personal characteristics, health-relat ed factors, and work-related factors associated with these forms of abuse. We used data from the Women Physicians' Health Study, a large (n = 4501 res pondents), nationally distributed questionnaire study that included questio ns on DV and SA histories, personal characteristics, and psychiatric, medic al, and work-related histories. We compared the characteristics of women ph ysicians with and without histories of DV or SA. The logistic models indica te that women physicians reporting DV histories (3.7% of the population) we re significantly (p < 0.05) less likely to be single and significantly more likely to report depression histories, suicide attempts, substance abuse, current or past cigarette smoking, severe daily stress at home, chronic fat igue syndrome, and DV experienced by their mothers. Women physicians report ing SA histories ((4.7% of the population) were significantly more likely t o be younger than 60 years, identify themselves as homosexual or bisexual, to have specialized in psychiatry, obstetrics and gynecology, or emergency medicine, and to report histories of depression, suicide attempts, eating d isorders,;and fair or poor perceived health status. Although the reported l ifetime prevalence of DV and SA among women physicians is below other repor ted figures, such experiences are associated with medical and psychiatric d ifficulties that could negatively affect them personally and professionally .