Family Violence Presentations to a Metropolitan Emergency Department During COVID-19: A Retrospective Audit

Social workers play an important role in emergency departments, including assessing and responding to family violence presentations. The COVID-19 pandemic introduced new social and environmental stressors that some workers feared could increase family violence rates. The pandemic impacted hospital emergency department staffing, making identifying and assessing family violence situations more difficult with social workers working virtually in the emergency department. This article describes a retrospective audit of hospital administrative data and family violence assessment records in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, before and after the COVID-19 outbreak. There was a statistically significant decrease in family violence presentations in 2020 compared to 2019. The findings from this audit can contribute to a better understanding of family violence presentation patterns during public health crises and inform further research on the impact of social work interventions in emergency department settings.IMPLICATIONSSocial workers can play an important role in identifying family violence cases in emergency departments.Social workers should be considered an important part of emergency department staffing in future state of emergencies or extreme events with respect to family violence identification and management.