Men’s perceived experiences of abuse in health care : their relationship to childhood abuse

Abstract

It has previously been shown in a Swedish female patient sample, that there is a statistical correlation between experiences of childhood emotional, physical and/or sexual abuse (EPSA), and perceived abuse in health care (AHC). Our aim was to investigate whether similar correlations exist in a Swedish male sample. The study was based on the male version of NorVold Abuse Questionnaire (m-NorAQ), and performed in a random sample from the Swedish population (n = 2,924), and a patient sample (n = 1,767). Any lifetime EPSA was associated to any lifetime AHC, and victims of adult AHC reported childhood EPSA more often than non-victims. There seems to be a dose-response relationship between childhood EPSA and adult AHC in both female and male samples, i.e. childhood experiences of EPSA is a risk factor for experiencing AHC in adulthood.