Swahnberg, Katarina, Post Doc

By Katherine Harrison on 20 May | 0 comments

Short biography
Katarina Swahnberg is associate professor at Gender and Medicine, Linköping University, Sweden. After having worked internationally as a clinical nurse, she took a master’s degree in studies of public health in 1999. During these studies she developed a research interest in gender violence, which resulted in a doctoral thesis on the topic in 2003. Building on this thesis, Katarina’s current research consists mainly of two themes: (1) abuse in health care, and (2) male and female victimisation and ill-health. Both projects have a strong focus on the development of interventions and changing violent practices. On top of her research, Katarina has several teaching assignments and is partly responsible for the integration of gender aspects in the education at the Medical Faculty at Linköping University.
 
GEXcel project, theme 4 & 5
Gender differences and ill health in patients revictimized in health care

Background: This project focus on developing concepts and theories in the fields of misuse of power in health care. Abuse in health care is commonly reported among patients but more so in females than males (sex ratio 1:2). In an earlier Swedish study we found that one third of female patients who had experienced adult abuse in health care had a background of childhood emotional, physical and/or sexual abuse; they were revictimized in health care. Poor self-rated health was strongly associated with abuse in health care in this group.

Several factors were associated to reporting abuse in health care in the “new victims” group; high educational level, physical complaints, posttraumatic stress symptoms, and sleeping problems. To use a gender perspective in identifying risk groups is one way to develop strategies to prevent abuse in health care.
Our aim will be to study gender differences in women and men who were “new victims” or revictimized in health care, and abuse characteristics and ill health.
Material: female and male patients, and males and females in random population samples (N= 9144).
Methods: cross-sectional questionnaire study. Associations between abuse in health care and key variables will be tested in multivariate models. Results will be interpreted and analyzed by means of the theoretical development in gender studies e.g. intersectionality, and within feminist science studies e.g. feminist cultural studies of techno science.

Preliminary results: shows that physicians are most common among reported male abusers, and nurses among female abusers. Sex of the abuser seems to have an impact on all factors mentioned above.

GEXcel Project, Theme 7 & 8
Though human trafficking is the fastest growing, criminal industry in the world; relatively little is known about the issue of human trafficking and the effectiveness of programs aimed at combating trafficking and rehabilitating victims/survivors. Current information on trafficking is largely anecdotal, and there is a lack of comprehensive, carefully documented research on trafficking from Nepal. However, non governmental organizations working in these sectors reveal that 70 districts out of 75 districts within the country are vulnerable in terms of human trafficking. The Government of Nepal has stressed the importance of research in human trafficking which is urgently required in its Action Plan to combat women and child prostitution. Research can motivate the government and civil society to take action once the extent of the problem is proven.

This project is a joint collaboration between Linköping University, Sweden and Kathmandu Medical College, Nepal. The research group has an extensive experience in research on gender based violence, as well as in teaching and in therapeutic work within the field. The overall aim for our research is to contribute to the prevention of trafficking of women and girls. Our first aim is to evaluate an intervention program against trafficking of women and girls from Nepal to India. Study methods will be developed as soon as we have established contact with existing anti-trafficking initiatives in Nepal. However, the evaluation will be based on both subjective and objective measures. A set of ten guidelines for interviewing trafficked women will be used to maintain research ethics throughout the study. Data will be collected, and transcribed, and translated into English in Nepal, while the analyses and writing of scientific reports will be done in Sweden collaboratively by Dr Sunil Kumar Joshi, who will be enrolled for 3 months, and Dr Katarina Swahnberg, who will be enrolled for 2 months, including the peak period 2010-10-11 to 2010- 10-22.

Our second aim is to develop a research plan for an intervention study against trafficking of women and girls from Nepal to India, on the basis of the results in the evaluation study mentioned above and literature studies.