News Release

High levels of sexual assault and long term distress among women attending sexual health clinics

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BMJ Specialty Journals

Psychological consequences of sexual assault among female attenders at a genitorurinary medicine clinic 2000;76:49-50

The level of sexual assault among women attending sexual health clinics could be more than one in five, reports a study in Sexually Transmitted Infections. The research also shows that the psychological consequences of being assaulted tend to be long-lasting.

Data were collected from women attending a genitourinary medicine clinic in the East of England. They were all asked to complete a questionnaire about whether they had ever been sexually assaulted and what the effects of this had been.

The results showed that more than one in five of the 268 respondents had been sexually assaulted. Over three-quarters of the assaults had been penetrative, and over a third of the women had been assaulted more than once. Previous research indicates that this high level of assault is not unusual. But the current study indicates that levels may be as high in provincial towns as they are in major cities.

Almost two-thirds of the women who had been assaulted continued to be distressed. Those women who had told two or more people about their experience were more distressed about what had happened than those women who told only one person or no-one. The time that had lapsed since the assault varied from a month to 36 years.

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Contact:

Dr Mime Mathews, Department of Genitorurinary Medicine, Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, Norwich

Fax: 01603 287 528 mime@mathews9.fsnet.co.uk


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