Barriers and facilitators of disclosures of domestic violence

from England and Wales report physical and sexual assault by a current or former partner; when financial and emotional abuse and threats of abuse are included, this increases to 25% of women. Two women are murdered by their partner or ex-partner every week in England and Wales and similar figures are reported internationally. One in seven men in the UK also report experiencing physical assault by a current/former partner, although these incidents are generally less serious than those reported by women. Domestic violence is associated with depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, insomnia, alcohol and drug misuse, suicide attempts and exacerbation of psychotic symptoms. It is therefore not surprising that higher rates of domestic violence are experienced by mental health service users compared with the general population. However, experiences of violence are underdetected in clinical settings and service users are reluctant to disclose such experiences in the absence of direct questioning. There has been little research in mental health settings on the professional barriers to enquiry about, and service user barriers to disclosure of, domestic violence. There has however been more research into barriers to disclosure of childhood abuse experienced by mental health service users. These studies have identified lack of training and confidence, severity of psychological disturbance and fear of exacerbating disturbance and clinicians’ beliefs about the reliability of clients’ accounts as barriers to routine enquiry about childhood abuse; these may also be relevant to enquiry about domestic violence. The aim of this study was to explore mental health service user and professional views on routine enquiry about domestic violence and to articulate facilitators and barriers to disclosure from both mental health service user and professional perspectives.