Preparedness to Respond to Family Violence: A Cross-Sectional Study Across Clinical Areas

Abstract

Introduction: Family violence (FV) is one of the most urgent health issues of our generation. While nurses play a vital role in identifying and supporting victim/survivors of violence, little is known about nursing readiness to respond across clinical areas.

Objective: This study aimed to compare and contrast the knowledge, confidence, clinical skills, and perceived barriers of nurses across three clinical areas of a tertiary trauma hospital in Melbourne, Australia, in responding to FV.

Method: A prospective, mixed methods design was used. The nursing staff at a large trauma hospital were approached to participate. Participants completed a brief online survey to quantify clinician-reported knowledge, clinical skills, and barriers to managing FV.

Results: Two hundred and forty-two nursing staff electronically completed a brief survey to capture self-reported confidence, knowledge, clinical skills, and barriers to working effectively in the area. The descriptive analysis reflected service-wide deficits in knowledge, confidence, and self-reported clinical skills, irrespective of the work area. Deficits were identified on a background of limited structured training for FV among this cohort. Significantly higher rates of FV confidence and knowledge were identified among emergency department nurses relative to acute and subacute clinical counterparts.

Conclusion: Nurse respondents overall reported low rates of confidence, knowledge, and clinical skills in responding to disclosures of FV. Findings reinforce the need for imbedded training programs to support frontline responses.

Keywords: domestic partner violence; family violence; hospital; mental health; nursing education; practice; public health; quantitative research; research.