Back to Annual Meeting

Back to Annual Meeting

APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

E. Anne Lown, DrPH¹, Laura A. Schmidt, PhD², James Wiley, PhD³, Laurie Jacobs, MA¹, and Denise M. Zabkiewicz, MPH⁴. (1) Alcohol Research Group, 2000 Hearst Street, Ste 300, Berkeley, CA 94705, 510-642-5208, ALown@arg.org, (2) Institute for Health Policy Studies and Department of Anthropology, History and Social Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, 3333 California Street, Suite 265, San Francisco, CA 94118, (3) Public Research Institute, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Ave, San Francisco, CA 94132, (4) School of Public Health, Department of Epidemiology, University of California, Berkeley, 2000 Hearst Ave., Suite 300, Berkeley, CA 94709

Background: Interpersonal Violence (IPV) against women on welfare can have serious consequences. While the currrent welfare system focuses on service provision, it remains unclear whether victimized women are able to access services that could help them recover from or prevent future assaults. This talk will document the pattern of IPV over 3 years and describe subsequent service use related to type and frequency of violence. Methods: Welfare applicants (N=1235 women) were surveyed in a northern California county during 2001. Those granted benefits were re-interviewed 12 and 24 months later. Each year, women were asked about past year IPV, demographic and health behavior along with use of health and social services. Results: At baseline 26% reported any IPV, 12.4% reported severe IPV, 10.8% reported IPV in two of the three years and 5.8% in all three years. IPV at baseline predicted year 3 use of services such as family violence prevention (13.9%), individual counseling (35.4%), group counseling (21.1%), religious counsel (38.3%) and ER (79.8%), though ER use was heavy for non-victimized women as well (66.1%). IPV predicted over twice the odds of social services use in the subsequent year. Severe IPV predicted over three times the odds for social service use each subsequent year. More years of violence was associated with more service use. However, overall social service use was still low given the need. Discussion: Among this sample of poor women, any violence, severe violence and repeated violence were all associated with higher odds of service use.

Learning Objectives:

• At the conclusion of the presentation participants should be able to identify patterns of interpersonal violence reported by women using welfare over three years. Participants will describe the type and amount of health and social service use by women reporting and not reporting violence.

Keywords: Welfare, Violence

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No