Intimate partner violence during pregnancy in Urmia, Iran in 2012

Background: In spite of enough prevalence data on Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) during pregnancy from many countries, there are still some regions such as the Middle East with relatively limited data. The purpose of research was to investigate the magnitude of IPV during pregnancy in an Iranian community. Methods: Thirty hundred fifty women during their postpartum period were invited to participate in a cross-sectional population-based study, but 10.6% of them refused participation. The data was compiled using the Abuse Assessment Screen questionnaire. Results: Of the 313 women, 55.9% reported violence during pregnancy. All types of violence were detected in victims during pregnancy, including psychological violence (43.5%), physical violence (10.2%), and sexual violence (17.2%). Intimate partner violence during pregnancy was significantly associated with lower education of the husbands (PR 1.64; 95% CI 1.15–2.36), un-employment of the husbands (PR 1.36; 95% CI 1.12–1.64), marriage duration of 5–9 years (PR 0.95; 95% CI 0.74–1.20) and gravidity of two (PR 0.80; 95% CI 0.59–1.08). Conclusion: The reported prevalence of IPV before and during pregnancy in this sample is substantially higher than estimates of exposure to violence in other parts of the globe, even the East Mediterranean region which has the highest prevalence estimation in the globe.