Prevalence of Violence in Iranian Pregnant Women: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Background And Aims: Violence against pregnant women is a significant public health problem, resulting in disability and various physical and mental health disorders. This systematic review and meta-analysis explored the prevalence of physical, verbal, sexual, psychological, emotional, economic, and other types of violence among pregnant women in Iran.

Methods: Bibliographic databases including PubMed, Embase, Web of Science (WoS), and Scopus, and also Iranian databases including Scientific Information Database (SID), Magiran, and Civilica were searched from 2002 to September 16, 2020. Following a random-effects meta-analysis, we estimated the pooled prevalence of exposure to different types of violence among Iranian pregnant women. Overall, 61 articles that met the inclusion criteria were analyzed in this systematic review.

Results: The prevalence of physical violence was 19.0% (95% confidence intervals [CI]: 14.0, 24.0), verbal violence was 42.0% (95% CI: 24.0, 61.0), sexual violence was 26.0% (95% CI: 20.0, 32.0), psychological violence was 37.0% (95% CI: 28.0, 46.0), emotional violence was 51.0% (95% CI: 40.0, 62.0), economic 39.0% (95% CI: 19.0, 60.0), and the prevalence of other types of violence was 54.0% (95% CI: 46.0, 62.0).

Conclusions: This study revealed that Iranian pregnant women are often exposed to different types of violence. Therefore, screening for violence in this vulnerable group seems necessary due to the sensitive nature of pregnancy and its importance in maternal ‎health. This alarming rate of violence calls for adopting upstream policies and interventions to reduce violent practices against pregnant women in Iran.