Trend and Pattern of Gender-Based Violence at Dang, Lumbini Province, Nepal

Background Gender Based Violence (GBV) is any harmful act that is perpetuated against a person’s will and is based on gender differences. Gender-based violence is a major public health problem and challenging issue which has a serious impact on an individual’s health and well-being. The main aim of this study is to identify the trend and pattern of gender based violence as well as the characteristics of GBV victims.Data & Methods This is a retrospective cross-sectional study where 458 records of 3 years are reviewed from July 2020 to July 2023 using census sampling method. Data were obtained from both the One-stop Crisis Management Centers (OCMC) of Dang district. Ethical approval was taken from Nepal Health Research Council (ref. no. 17) and approval letter obtain from both the concerned authority of OCMCs. Data entry was done in EpiData. Descriptive and inferential analysis was performed in SPSS. Chi-square test was used for association analysis where p-value <0.05 at 95% confidence interval is taken as statistical significant association.Results The study shows the increasing trend of GBV. Among all registered cases in OCMC, half of them were rape cases (50.1%). Study also demonstrate that, adolescents (43%) were most affected age group of GBV victims. Different socio-demographic variables such as age of victim, education and occupation of victim, ethnicity, knowingness with culprit and marital status shows significant association at p-value <0.05 with different forms of gender based violence like rape, physical violence, mental harassment, sexual harassment etc.Conclusions: The study highlights not only the evolving trends of GBV in Dang district but also revealing the alarming trends in sexual violence/rape against adolescent and physical/mental violence against young adults. A coordinated combined legal, educational and economic interventions are needed focusing adolescent girls and women to address GBV.