Mental healthcare use of women who perpetrate intimate partner abuse: A case-linkage study.

Abstract

Objective: To determine the mental healthcare use of women with a police-recorded history of perpetrating intimate partner abuse, focusing on general population comparisons and characteristics of past victimisation and perpetration associated with specific service use.

Methods: Population-level Victorian mental health databases were linked to women with a police-recorded history of perpetrating intimate partner abuse (N = 145). Rates of mental health service use were compared to same-aged women in the general population between 2016 and 2019. Patterns of mental health service use were examined using descriptive statistics and logistic regression models, controlling for age.

Results: Compared to women in the general population, women who perpetrated intimate partner abuse had substantially higher rates of acute and outpatient public mental health service use both across the lifetime and during the 4-year incidence period of study. Women with multiple reports of perpetrating family violence had significantly more mental health service use than women with only a single report. Prior family violence victimisation, despite being present in almost three quarters of our sample, did not significantly increase the odds of lifetime mental health service use beyond the effects of perpetrating intimate partner abuse.

Conclusion: Women who perpetrate intimate partner abuse may have more severe and incapacitating mental health needs than women in the general population, and acute mental health needs appear to increase as frequency of perpetration increases. Future research should examine if and to what extent addressing mental health needs may play a role in reducing women's intimate partner abuse perpetration.