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Asking the difficult questions: Building the capacity of community paediatricians to routinely enquire and respond to family violence
Author(s) -
Gibbons Claire L,
Holmes Hilary,
Bragg Judith,
Neeman Teresa
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
journal of paediatrics and child health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.631
H-Index - 76
eISSN - 1440-1754
pISSN - 1034-4810
DOI - 10.1111/jpc.13704
Subject(s) - medicine , audit , odds ratio , domestic violence , confidence interval , family medicine , poison control , suicide prevention , injury prevention , nursing , pediatrics , psychiatry , medical emergency , management , pathology , economics
Aim To enhance the confidence and capacity of community paediatricians and paediatric trainees to identify and respond to family violence, through a series of education sessions and evidence‐based recommendations. Methods The action research methodology included a literature search to review the data on family violence education programmes and evidence‐based family violence screening tools. Six education sessions were then developed and held for physicians at the Community Paediatric and Child Health Service ( CPCHS ). An audit was performed on the charts of all new referrals to the CPCHS for a period of 18 months prior to the education sessions and 5 months following the education sessions. A questionnaire was distributed at the first and final education sessions to gauge physician comfort with enquiry into family violence. Results The documented rate of enquiry into family violence at CPCHS was 24% in the retrospective chart audit. Following the series of education sessions, the documented rate of enquiry increased to 60% ( P < 0.05, odds ratio 4.7, confidence interval 2.7–8.4). The documented rate of disclosure of family violence also increased from 13% of all new patients in the retrospective chart audit to 24% in the prospective arm of the study ( P < 0.05, odds ratio 2.1, confidence interval 1.0–4.0). Following the education sessions, all participants agreed that they routinely enquired about family violence and were comfortable enquiring about family violence. Conclusion This study demonstrates that clinician education about family violence supports routine enquiry about family violence in community paediatric consultations.