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Current issues in providing sexual assault medical forensic exams in rural areas
Published in Rachel E. Lovell, Jennifer Langhinrichsen-Rohling, Sexual Assault Kits and Reforming the Response to Rape, 2023
Bridget Diamond-Welch, Mattie Jones, Brianna Zimmer
When a health professional who interacts with a survivor of sexual assault is inexperienced, espouses rape myths, or is disrespectful to the patient, the result can be secondary victimization of these survivors (Ranjbar & Speer, 2013). Secondary victimization is a re-traumatization experienced by the survivor of assault based on their treatment by responders such as health-care providers. This has been documented to occur when the survivor receives inadequate care, experiences long wait times (with Littel, 2001 providing an upward bound of waiting for ten hours without being allowed to use the bathroom), being refused HIV prophylaxis when indicated or emergency contraception (such as Plan B) because of the beliefs of providers or the hospital system (Campbell & Raja, 1999). Littel (2001) argues that addressing the trauma caused by ill-prepared health professionals was an impetus for the development of SANE programs through which health-care professionals are trained on how to properly conduct exams in a non-victim blaming manner.
Cultural issues and management
Published in Robert Jones, Fiona Jenkins, Managing and Leading in the Allied Health Professions, 2021
Most government initiatives to improve people’s health in Britain have focused on strategies to change individual behaviour, often adopting a ‘victim blaming’ stance. It is now known, however, that our behaviour is to a large degree determined by our social circumstances.18 If drug users are returned to the community without support following successful treatment, for example, they are likely to drift back to their old way of life with the people they know and trust.19 This is not to suggest that personal approaches are never beneficial. Personal empowerment, through assertiveness training for example, can be helpful, especially if it is linked with social support and evidence of positive change.11
Health Promotion: Empowering Choice
Published in Lynn B. Myers, Kenny Midence, Adherence to Treatment in Medical Conditions, 2020
The term victim blaming, which has been espoused by health promotion, is not specific to health concerns but is considered by Ryan (1976) to be at the heart of general social problems. This is, perhaps, worth underlining since broader social measures may have a more substantial effect on health and illness than specific health programmes. A flavour of the thinking and the arresting polemical nature of the book is provided by the following quotation: “Being poor is stressful. Being poor is worrisome; one is anxious about the next meal, the next dollar, the next day. Being poor is nerve-wracking, upsetting. When you’re poor, its easy to despair and it’s easy to lose your temper. And all of this is because you’re poor. Not because your mother let you go around with your diapers full of a bowel movement until you were four, or shackled you to the potty chair before you could walk. Not because she broke your bottle on your first birthday or breast-fed you until you could cut your own steak. But because you don’t have any money,” Ryan (1976).
A missed research opportunity for effective prevention: Clery Act Timely Warning Notices
Published in Journal of American College Health, 2022
Sandra H. Sulzer, Joanna Messer Kimmitt, Maya Miyairi Steel, Shantoyia Jones, Tia Smith, Hayley May Loos, Amanda DeRito, Cleve Redmond
This climate of non-tolerance can also be created through implicit victim blaming in Timely Warning Notices. Victim blaming can be implied through the nature of recommendations that colleges offer in these communications. For example, including common recommendations such as walk in pairs, or do not wear earbuds while walking, puts the onus on victims to prevent their own rapes, and has been associated with greater acceptance of rape myths.11 Such recommendations often include guidance for victims to receive self-defense training. Although some feminist researchers have previously argued in support of the effectiveness of self-defense training courses for victims, especially in regards to improving feelings of self-confidence, 13,14 other research shows such training either has no effect (demonstrated in a number of studies) or can potentially cause harm.11 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention15 also does not list nor discuss self-defense training as an effective or evidence-based prevention strategy.16,17
Protecting Victims of Bullying: The Protective Roles Self-Esteem and Self-Forgiveness Play between past Victimization and Current Depressive Symptoms
Published in Journal of School Violence, 2021
Elise Choe, Emily Srisarajivakul, Don E. Davis
One concern about researching the possible role of self-forgiveness as a protective factor among victims of bullying is the idea of victim blaming. Victim blaming is when the blame/reason for the bullying is redirected onto the victim (Chen & Cheng, 2019). Considering that victims may already be internalizing blame for being victimized (e.g., Schacter et al., 2015), there is a possible concern that focusing on self-forgiveness may reinforce those messages and beliefs. This may especially be the case for victims of bias-based bullying. This is a phenomenon where bullying is motivated by a person’s membership in a social group (e.g., race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, etc.; Bucchianeri et al., 2014). For these victims, the reasons for the bullying are unchangeable, and perpetrators attitudes largely stem from perceived differences in a victim’s personal characteristics or social status (Killen, 2007). In these cases, there should be nothing for which the victim should forgive or blame him/herself; instead, it should be the responsibility of the greater community or society to change perpetrators’ attitudes and behaviors while also reducing the deleterious effects of bullying on the victims (e.g., Baams et al., 2017). At the same time, if victims are already experiencing self-blame, further research on factors that can mitigate those internal beliefs is also necessary. Examining self-forgiveness as an additional protective construct in research, and eventually as an intervention tool, for victims of bullying may be the next step forward.
Truth before reconciliation, antiracism before cultural safety
Published in Contemporary Nurse, 2021
Leanne Poitras Kelly, Christina Chakanyuka
The term victim blaming can trigger resistance and moral outrage when placed within the language of health care. Nurses and other helping professionals have built their professional image on a caring narrative that does not transparently interrogate unintended harms in our practice (Adams, 2016; Barker et al., 1995; Blackstock, 2009; Paterson & Crawford, 1994; Smith, 2020). The foundational language of nursing includes terms such as client-centered care, which precludes the possibility that we might inadvertently judge a patient, much less blame them. Our reliance on “evidence-based practice” positions our professional knowledge above the experiences of those we serve. We forget that much of what we call best practice is situated within a Western biomedical tradition supported by neoliberal, consumer driven and colonial hierarchies (Foth et al., 2018; Smith, 2020). Within this framework, nurses often struggle to understand and accommodate poor patient health status they deem a result of unhealthy choices. This can be particularly evident for clients we deem complex who reside within the intersections of resource-poor social arenas and ascribed social-deficit narratives. Our reliance on risk categories to classify and segregate individuals and populations fails to recognize colonizing systems, which have a far greater impact than individual choice (Smith, 2020; Varcoe et al., 2019).