Grant: Health System Impact Fellowships - PostDoc Central Canada 2 year

Intimate partner violence (IPV) has severe health consequences, especially among women, for whom IPV is the most common form of violence experienced. Healthcare providers thus serve as an important point of contact for identifying cases of IPV. Yet healthcare screening and service responses for IPV have been hampered by a lack of staff training on responding to patient disclosure, patient discomfort in disclosing to staff, and inadequate service availability or accessibility following disclosure. In line with the goals of the host partner organization, St. Michael's Hospital, this program of work aims to strengthen the hospital's IPV screening and integrated response strategies in three ways. First, I will evaluate whether a novel mobile application for IPV screening implemented in the hospital's fracture clinic - a high-risk setting for patients to present with IPV-related injuries - is feasible and acceptable to staff and patients and effective in meeting patients' IPV-related needs. Second, using routine hospital data I will identify departments where patients are most commonly presenting with IPV experiences and characteristics of these patients to inform intervention priorities. Finally, I will work with partner organizations and stakeholders to develop and pilot strategies for integrated care between hospital and community services to better address the needs of high-risk patients experiencing IPV. This work is relevant to CIHR-IHSPR, in that it aims to strengthen evidence- and patient-informed health services and integrated care, and CIHR-IGH, given its sex and gender approach. In particular, analyses will explore the intersections between IPV and gender and sex variables and intervention strategies will be developed and evaluated accounting for differences in IPV experiences and related needs across gender and sexual identities. These considerations will further be supported by my academic collaboration with the Centre for Sexual and Gender Minority Health.