The importance of Covid-19 for the opportunities for abused women to receive support and treatment

In the ongoing study What works and why?

The significance of how interventions and cooperation among organizations affect victim’s health and wellbeing we explore the support and interventions delivered to victims of domestic violence by specialized units within social welfare.

In this application for a supplementary grant, we propose an extension of the ongoing study to investigate how victims of domestic violence were affected by the pandemic in their search for help and if they believe that the quality of the interventions received was affected by Covid-19.

Further we aim to explore how professionals and employees at women’s shelters experience the consequences of the pandemic for their clients, and how it affects their interventions.In this extended study, we will conduct interviews with social workers and managers in the social services as well as employees at women’s shelters.

Furthermore, in connection with existent sub-studies, we use both structured interviews and in-depth interviews to investigate how women exposed to violence perceive and experience how Covid-19 has affected their help-seeking and their treatment.

We also intend to collect data on how Covid-19 has affected opportunities for various stakeholders to collaborate for the benefit of victims of domestic violence.

Our ongoing study and strong relations to the social work practice field enable access to data.Our proposed study will create new knowledge that can be used to develop complementary support measures and to better prepare for the future.

The new knowledge is believed to be of direct benefit to the participants as well as the social work practice field in large. The results from the study enables organizations in the domestic violence field to better handle future challenges. Results will be disseminated through a website, articles, and a conference.