The Family Support Centre at the ANGAU Hospital in PNG provides holistic care for people escaping domestic or social violence, including sexual violence. From January to September 2015, ANGAU FSC provided medical consultations and counselling support for 799 people, 95 percent of whom were women and girl survivors. With support from the Australian aid program, through the Pacific Women Shaping Pacific Development initiative ANGAU FSC has introduced an enhanced data collection tool that enables staff to record the nature of each case.
Data are now being collected around themes such as women living with disabilities, violence during pregnancy and incest. Types of cases recorded using the new system have included abduction, kidnapping and rape, forced hard child labour, child abuse and rape of minors, forced sex and hard labour by step fathers, gang rape, insertion of objects in vagina, attempted murder by intimate partners, attempted suicide, and violence in pregnancy.
The data collected offers an evidence base for developing programs to reduce violence against women and girls and provide appropriate medical and psychological treatment. Through understanding the nature of violence that is occurring, it is possible to develop targeted activities in response.
Data is also collected regarding the treatment provided at ANGAU Hospital. For example, in 387 cases, patients reported feeling mentally healthier after receiving counselling support. The reporting also shows how ANGAU FSC is linking with other services for survivors of violence: 175 cases were referred to the new Case Management Centre in Lae (Femili PNG also a Pacific Women partner) to support further follow up and 110 of the 263 medical reports that were written were issued to survivors and the police for court processes.
ANGAU FSC also uses this information in policy work. They made a substantial contribution to drafting the Gender Based Violence Health Curriculum for health institutions in PNG and made submissions to the parliamentary inquiry into violence against women and children in PNG.
Sr Anastaia Wakon, Sister In Charge of ANGAU FSC, shared:
'The data management tool is an excellent tool and has been very helpful in recording detailed data and information on a survivor's medical as well as psychological condition. In the past we recorded all information as normal trauma, not explicitly as medical or psychological. I am proud of this progress as now I am able to report on medical and psychological interventions better. I would like to see the tool being rolled out to family support centres in other provinces'.
More information
- 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence 25 November – 10 December 2016
- Pacific Women Shaping Pacific Development