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2023 Faculty of Clinical Medicine and Dentistry NEWPORT INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC AND EXPERIMENTAL SCIENCES

The Prevalence and Factors Associated with Sexual Violence among Women Seeking HIV Services at Kyabugimbi Health Center IV in Bushenyi District, Western Uganda

Rinah Agasha

Sexual violence occurs throughout the whole world with about 35.6% women have experienced intimate partnerviolence and/ or non-partner sexual violence especially those in low-income countries. This study determined theprevalence and forms of sexual violence among women seeking HIV services at Kyabugimbi health center inBushenyi district, Western Uganda. This was a cross-sectional study among 96 HIV positive women at Kyabugimbihealth center Bushenyi district, Western Uganda. I used a researcher administered questionnaire to collect data onsociodemographic characteristics, burden and forms of sexual violence, services sought by the victims and sexualviolence screening by health workers. Data were analyzed with Chi square and logistic regression using SPSSversion 20 at 95% level of significance. A total of 96 women participated in the study with a mean age of 35.05 ±12.212 years and majority had primary level of education. The prevalence of sexual violence among the studyparticipants was 31.3% (30/96). The most common forms of sexual violence were forced genital touching and sexualhumiliation. Husbands of the victims were the most common perpetrators, less than a quarter of the victims of sexualviolence disclosed the incidents and only 1*5% of the victims sought medical help. The common medical help soughtincluded post-exposure prophylaxis (4.9%), HIV test (9.3%) and emergency contraception (5.6%). Being married (p= 0.035, 95%CI 0.069-0.905) was protective against sexual violence. A third of HIV women seeking care fromKyabugimbi health center in Bushenyi district experience sexual violence, more than three quarters of the victimsdo not disclose the incidents to other people and very few seek medical help. The most common forms of sexualviolence include forced genital touching, sexual humiliation and insertion of an object into genitalia.