Domestic Violence in Methamphetamine Psychotic Users, Psychiatric Inpatients and Healthy People: A Comparative Study

Domestic violence is a severe threat to the physical and mental health ofwomen. The aim of the present study was to find and compare domestic violence frequencybetween methamphetamine users, patients with psychiatric disorders and healthy people. Inthis analytical cross-sectional study, methamphetamine users (n=30) and patients withpsychiatric disorders (n=30) were women whose husbands were hospitalized during 2014 inShafa Psychiatric Hospital in Guilan. Diagnosis was done with DSMIV-TR. Healthy people(n=60) were women whose husbands had no primary or drug induced psychiatric disorder oraddiction. CTS-2 test was used to evaluate violence. The frequency of psychological,physical and sexual violence in the groups suffering from psychiatric disease andmethamphetamine users was higher than that of the healthy group (P=0.001). We observed adirect correlation between the mean of psychological and physical violence in three groups(r=0.9, P =0.001), (r=0.7, P =0.0001) and (r=0.53, P=0.005), respectively. The directcorrelation between the psychological and physical violence was just observed in the healthygroup (r= 0.8, P=0.007). The results showed that methamphetamine users such as psychiatricpatients are at increased risk of violence. Domestic violence screening in these patients isnecessary. It seems that this substance is a new source of increasing domestic violence andalso more undesirable outcomes in Iran.

Keywords:

Domestic violence , Methamphetamine , Psychotic disorders , Inpatients