Challenges to Detecting and Addressing Intimate Partner Violence Among Roma Women in Spain: Perspectives of Primary Care Providers

The Imperative Need for Criminological Research on the European Roma: A Narrative Review

Except for the knowledge that the Roma people endure harsh conditions and are victims of discrimination, scarce criminological research has given detailed attention to further victimisation or offending among the Romanies. Identifying articles in the browsers Web of Science, Google Scholar and Google, we reviewed European publications (1997-2020) in English, French, Romanian or Spanish that addressed the Roma's victimisation or offending. The 44 studies that matched our criteria suggested that (1) Roma people are victims of hate crimes with devastating consequences; (2) Roma children and women are victims of domestic violence to a greater degree than other groups, although the Roma tend to oppose violence against women; (3) forced early marriages exist among some Romanies and may cause serious problems in adulthood; (4) youth delinquency among the Roma does not differ from that of the non-Roma, although Roma adolescents face more deprivation; (5) Roma men and women are overrepresented in prison and face many difficulties in re-entering society once they are released and (6) there are organised criminal activities in some Roma groups that are supported by their community. Further rigorous post-positivist research, particularly quantitative, is needed to generalise the findings and replicate former studies. Areas of special interest are the causes of anti-Roma discrimination other than ethnicity, the victimisation of children, the Roma's lack of institutional trust and the relation between victimisation and offending. Conducting comparisons with the general population is essential, and we propose that victims' surveys and self-reported delinquency studies include questions on ethnicity.

Analysis of the geographic pattern of the police reports for domestic violence in Girona (Spain)

Background

There are many studies that address the issue of gender-based violence, but few analyse the police-reported cases. It is as important to analyse the temporal and geographic distribution of these incidents as it is the sociodemographic profile of the accuser. To this effect, the present study aims to analyse the sociodemographic profile of the victims of the particular case of domestic violence that report the incident to the police and to evaluate the spatial–temporal distribution of these reports.

Methods

Using the data from a database containing the police-reported incidents of domestic violence in Girona in the period 2012–2018, the risk of a police-reported incident was estimated by adjusting the two-part Hurdle model.

Results

The risk of reporting incidents of domestic violence to the police is higher in the less deprived areas of the city, and the spatial distribution of these police reports corroborate this finding. Nevertheless, those areas with the greatest socio-economic deprivation were also the ones where there were less police reports filed. Also the prediction of less police reports in the census tract with the highest percentage of the population with an insufficient educational level coincides with the largest number of police reports made by women with a medium and university level education (56.1%) compared with 9.5% of police reports made by women with insufficient schooling.

Conclusions

These results can be useful for social protection services to design policies specifically aimed at women residing in those areas with the highest risk. Moreover, the use of spatial statistical techniques together with geographic information systems tools is a good strategy to analyse domestic violence and other types of offences because they not only allow to graphically identify the spatial distribution, but it is also a good tool to identify problems related to this type of offence.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12889-022-12916-4.

Application of Andersen's behavioural model of health services use: a scoping review with a focus on qualitative health services research

INTRODUCTION

Qualitative methods have become integral in health services research, and Andersen's behavioural model of health services use (BMHSU) is one of the most commonly employed models of health service utilisation. The model focuses on three core factors to explain healthcare utilisation: predisposing, enabling and need factors. A recent overview of the application of the BMHSU is lacking, particularly regarding its application in qualitative research. Therefore, we provide (1) a descriptive overview of the application of the BMHSU in health services research in general and (2) a qualitative synthesis on the (un)suitability of the model in qualitative health services research.

METHODS

We searched five databases from March to April 2019, and in April 2020. For inclusion, each study had to focus on individuals ≥18 years of age and to cite the BMHSU, a modified version of the model, or the three core factors that constitute the model, regardless of study design, or publication type. We used MS Excel to perform descriptive statistics, and applied MAXQDA 2020 as part of a qualitative content analysis.

RESULTS

From a total of 6319 results, we identified 1879 publications dealing with the BMSHU. The main methodological approach was quantitative (89%). More than half of the studies are based on the BMHSU from 1995. 77 studies employed a qualitative design, the BMHSU was applied to justify the theoretical background (62%), structure the data collection (40%) and perform data coding (78%). Various publications highlight the usefulness of the BMHSU for qualitative data, while others criticise the model for several reasons (eg, its lack of cultural or psychosocial factors).

CONCLUSIONS

The application of different and older models of healthcare utilisation hinders comparative health services research. Future research should consider quantitative or qualitative study designs and account for the most current and comprehensive model of the BMHSU.