Spousal Violence and Mental Health Status in Women Attending Maternal Health Care Center in Sedfa City, Assiut Governorate, Egypt

Background: Violence against women is a universal phenomenon that affects not only
women physical and mental health but also affects their behavior and their every day’s
activity. Objective: To measure the prevalence of violence and explore its effect on the
mental health status of women. Method: A cross-sectional comparative study was
carried out on 500 women attending the Sedfa health center during the last year from
October 2016 using a semi-structured questionnaire personal interview and WHO Self-
Reporting Questionnaire (SRQ-20). Study proposal was approved by Faculty of Medicine
IRB before data collection. Also, an official permission from Assiut health directorate
was obtained. Appropriate hypothesis testing tests were used and p- value ≤ 0.05 was
used as the significance level. Results: In the year prior to the study, 4 out of 10
participants were victims of verbal violence, husbands were the committer in 71.3% of all
violent events, less than one fifth (17.6% ) of violence victims in the present study sought
help, and woman’s family is the source of support in more than three quarters of those
who asked for help. Predictors for exposure to violence were husband’s drug abuse and
living in extended family (OR = 8.2, 1.7 respectively). Generally, women exposed to
violence achieved higher scores of SRQ-20 with 49.0% were classified as affected mental
health status. Exposure to violence significantly increases poor mental health status risk
by about 3 times (OR = 2.86, P<0.001). Conclusions: Women in Sedfa city are exposed
to spousal violence which has a negative effect on their mental health status.