Psychotropic drug use among women exposed to intimate partner violence: A population-based study

To investigate psychotropic drug use among women ever exposed to intimate partner violence (IPV) in relation to mental distress and sociodemographic, lifestyle and somatic health characteristics, and to assess whether drug use differed for physical and/or sexual violence compared with psychological abuse alone.

Cross-sectional data from women aged 30-60 years were drawn from self-reported questionnaires in the Oslo Health study 2000-2001. Women reporting hypnotic, anxiolytic and/or antidepressant drug use in the previous four weeks were defined as users. Differences in psychotropic drug use by IPV exposure were examined by logistic regression analyses.

In total, 880 (14%) of 6,471 included women reported ever experiencing IPV; 494 (8%) reported physical and/or sexual IPV, and 386 (6%) reported psychological IPV alone. Physical and/or sexual IPV was significantly associated with use of all psychotropic drugs: hypnotics (odds ratio (OR) 2.28; 95% confidence interval (95% CI), 1.73-3.00); anxiolytics (OR 3.29; 95% CI, 2.43-4.44); and antidepressants (OR 2.72; 95% CI, 1.97-3.76). The associations remained significant for anxiolytics (OR 1.67; 95% CI, 1.14-2.45) and antidepressants (OR 1.50; 95% CI, 1.02-2.19) after adjusting for mental distress, sociodemographic, lifestyle and somatic health characteristics. Psychological IPV alone was associated with use of anxiolytics (OR 1.81; 95% CI, 1.20-2.75) and antidepressants (OR 2.38; 95% CI, 1.64-3.45). After adjustments the association persisted for use of antidepressants only (OR 1.64; 95% CI, 1.05-2.55).

Women exposed to IPV were more likely to report use of psychotropic drugs, even after adjusting for mental distress. The study indicates that exposure to IPV; including psychological abuse should be evaluated as a possible source of distress when psychotropic drug treatment is considered.