Investigation of Rate of Domestic Violence against Women Presenting to Legal Medicine Centers and its Coping Methods: A Descriptive Study

Violence exerts negative effects on nutritional status and digestive system of women provoking mental disorders among them. The aim of this study was to determine the rate of domestic violence against women presenting to legal medicine centers and its coping methods. A total of 150 women sustaining domestic violence presenting to legal medicine centers in Iran were selected as participants of this descriptive study using convenience sampling method. Data were collected through demographic information questionnaire, WHO standard domestic violence questionnaire, and a researcher-made inventory of coping with domestic violence against women and analyzed through SPSS version 23.0 using Mann-Whitney test, correlation coefficient, and independent t test. We found mental violence as the most common type of violence against women followed by physical and sexual violence. There was a significant correlation between women’s age and problem-based strategy, women’s occupation and problem-based strategy, marriage duration and coping strategy, marriage duration and problem-based method, consent at the time of marriage and excitement-centered strategy, presence of disease and excitement-centered strategy, and drug abuse and excitement-centered strategy, and a reverse significant correlation between excitement-centered strategy and sexual violence and between problem-based strategy and mental violence. Some training classes ought to be held to provide appropriate coping strategies for women sustaining violence.