A comparison of depression and anxiety among female victims of Spouse violence and healthy controls

Background: Depression, anxiety, and other psychiatric problems are frequent consequences of spousal violence. The present study was designed to compare these psychiatric consequences between female victims of spousal violence and healthy controls in Babul. Materials and methods: Of 17 active primary health care centres in Babul, 5 were randomly selected and all referrals during a 6-month period were included. Totally, 240 women agreed to participate in our study of whom 120 were victims of spousal violence and 120 were normal healthy controls. All subjects were requested to complete Beck depression inventory, Beck anxiety scale and spouse abuse questionnaire. Finally, differences between groups were analyzed using Student's unpaired t-test or χ2 test, when appropriate.Results: Of 120 female victims of spousal violence, 75 (62.5%) experienced emotional maltreatments, while 29 (24.2%) and 16 (13.3%) were physically and sexually abused, respectively. Meanwhile, 43.3% of female victims were both physically and emotionally abused by their husband while 23.3% experienced all the three forms of spouse violence. The mean depression and anxiety scores were significantly higher in female victims of spousal violence when compared to healthy control (p<0.001 and p<0.01, respectively). Conclusion: With respect to the high prevalence of depression and anxiety among female victims of spousal violence, authorities should observe preventive modalities for domestic violence especially against women. This could be achieved by promoting men and women knowledge through anger control and problem-solving skills

Keywords:

Spousal violence , Anxiety , Depression , women