Psychiatric distress and use of health services among women attending gynecology clinics in Beirut, Lebanon

This study investigated the relationship of psychiatric distress with health services use. The analyses were performed on 322 women attending gynecology clinics in two teaching hospitals in Beirut, Lebanon. Data on utilization were obtained retrospectively from women's self report for the six months prior to the study, and psychiatric distress was assessed using the 28 item-GHQ. Psychiatric distress had a borderline significance with health services use measured as total number of physicians' visits. Interaction of distress with employment status of the women was found significantly positively related to health services use. When we separated physician's visits into visits to gynecologists and visits to other health care providers, distress did not relate significantly to any of the two outcomes. Having a chronic condition was the most powerful predictor of use both in additive and multiplicative way. Chronic illness interacted with stressful life events and regular care to explain the total number of visits and visits to gynecologists.