One of our friends, Dr. Anand Philip have written this great article on the serious medical consequences faced by a woman livin in an abusive relationship.

In his article he had first broken the myth of ‘he is otherwise a nice guy.’ In absolutely unambigous terms he emphasizes that any man who habitually abuses his partner / wife can never be a ‘nice’ guy. Arguments like, he is nice when he is not drunk; ‘if she will not provoke him he will not be abusive; she somehow needs a bit of strict hands; are pure manifestation of our own cowardice and spinelessness which stops us from helping the victim. He further talks about the medical implications of abuse, to quote him:

Physical abuse has not just physical effects, it affects the woman’s mental emotional and social health also.

A significant portion of women who have been abused do not seek medical help for the injuries themselves, but those who do, present with non specific and chronic pain and bruises from having “bumped into something”. Women who suffer long term abuse, and are battered are found to have more injuries in the head, face, neck, thorax,  breasts, and abdomen when compared women injured in other ways. 1

Many women also have to put up with forced sex from intimate partners, which results in sexually-transmitted diseases, bleeding or infection, fibroids, genital irritation, pain on intercourse, and urinary-tract infection. Studies show that the odds of having gynecological problems is upto 3 times more in victims of physical abuse.

Mental effects of abuse are quiet profound too, some studies have shown that the risk of depression and post traumatic stress disorder was higher for abuse victims than even those who have had childhood sexual abuse.

• Fractures
• Miscarriage
• Depression
• Major Surgery
• lacerations requiring stitches
• Sexually transmitted infections including HIV
• Loss of vision/hearing

These are some of the prominent outcomes of intimate partner violence that most studies find. 2

In more than half of the cases of abuse, children are witnesses to it. And in upto 5% cases even the children are abused by the partners.

A study from rural south India showed that thirty-four percent of the women surveyed reported having ever been hit, forced to have sex by their husbands or both. Women belonging to lower caste, poorer households, having greater economic autonomy, and whose husbands consumed alcohol were more likely to report violence. Women’s economic autonomy and husbands’ alcohol consumption were significantly associated with violence, independent of caste and economic status^.

The most important points made by Anand in his piece is that how the helth care givers have no understanding of how to identify victims of domestic violence and extend help to them. There is a need to train all kinds of service providers from health care to legal on gender sensitivity and violence against women issues so that they handle a case more efficiently.

Many times health care workers who are the first to see the results of intimate partner violence fail to identify it or do nothing about it. This and the social approval for domestic abuse ensures that she “normalizes” the abuse. She is deluded, as people around her that she deserves it, or that he is otherwise nice, or that there is nothing that can be done to help her.

We need to realize that at this stage, it is no longer a personal matter, it is public. We need to step in. Perhaps there is a stressor, maybe the guy is mentally unstable, or there might be substance abuse, or maybe he is just a jerk, whatever be, if we stand by looking, we are accomplices to the slow murder of usr friend, soul first then her body.

About the author

Anand describles himself as, “A doctor tired of pill pushing and taking the road less traveled, believes in non violence, people and other impossible things.” He is a staunch supporter of women rights and gender equality, a fact that is very evident from his social media spaces like blog, twitter and facebook. We salute male heros like him who speak up against violence and ‘Ring the Bell‘ in their own way.

Read the Full Article here