Prevalence and consequences related to sexual violence in perimenopausal women and beyond: A systematic review

Sexual violence can occur at any time in women's life and cause much physical, psychological and emotional harm for them. Sexual violence against perimenopausal women has more adverse consequences for middle-aged women, their families and society. The present review study was conducted with aim to investigate prevalence and consequences related to sexual violence in perimenopausal women and beyond.

In this systematic review study, to find the related studies, scientific databases such as PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, ProQuest, SID, and Magiran were searched using the related keywords. All Persian and English articles from January 31, 2010 to January 31, 2020 that studied sexual violence in perimenopausal women were included in this study. All observational studies including descriptive, descriptive-analytical, case-control and cohort studies entered in this study. Articles were evaluated according to Strobe criteria. Good quality articles were included in this systematic review.

In this study, 482 articles were reviewed, of which 7 articles met the inclusion criteria. The results of this study showed that the prevalence of sexual violence in women varied between different races and was associated with education, economic status, smoking and alcohol consumption. There was a risk of hypertension, elevated neuroendocrines, and proinflammatory cytokines in perimenopausal women with sexual violence. Also, increased menopausal symptoms such as urinary symptoms, sleep disorders and symptoms of depression and anxiety, vaginal problems and sexual dysfunction were associated with sexual violence.

Sexual violence has harmful physical and psychological consequences for middle-aged women. Therefore, the results of this study can be a guide for health planners to reduce this health-social problem and solve the related problems by providing the necessary counseling programs in middle-aged women.