Designing a Peer Navigation Program Alongside Women With Lived Experience of Domestic, Family, and Sexual Violence

Domestic, family, and sexual violence (DFSV) is a significant public health issue. There are currently large gaps in prevention, early intervention, and longer-term recovery and healing support for victim-survivors of DFSV. Implementing peer navigation programs to support victim-survivors has the potential to address some of these gaps. Yet there is a lack of current research on the components necessary to implement these programs, including in primary care settings.

To develop core components of a DFSV peer navigation program tailored to primary care settings.

A participatory design approach bringing together women with lived experience of DFSV, health practitioners, and researchers.

We designed five core components of a peer navigation program: (1) Walking Alongside: Peer-Informed Relational Care; (2) Peer Navigation as Practical Support; (3) Safe and Ethical Practice in Peer Navigation; (4) Role Clarity and Boundary-Setting; and (5) Organisational Supports for Peer Navigation Practice. In presenting these results, we also highlight reflections on our design process.

The implementation of peer navigation programs for victim-survivors can provide survivor-centred relational and practical support. Ensuring effective implementation of peer navigation programs must address key challenges, particularly in ensuring safety and wellbeing of victim-survivors and peer navigators through DFSV-informed primary care practice. These findings can inform the implementation of peer navigation programs for victim-survivors to promote care that prioritises trusting relationships, agency, and pragmatic support.

This research centred the lived expertise of victim-survivors. We established a Working Group of women with lived experience of DFSV, health practitioners, and researchers to design the components of a peer navigation program, using our lived, living, and learned (professional) expertise. Women with lived experience were involved in the study design, as members of the Working Group, and in manuscript authorship.