Health-care providers offering care to women should receive in-service training, ensuring it:

• enables them to provide first-line support
• teaches them appropriate skills, including:
• when and how to enquire
• the best way to respond to women (refer to

sections 2 Identification and care for survivors of intimate partner violence and 3, Clinical care for survivors of sexual assault)

• how to conduct forensic evidence collection where

appropriatea

• addresses:
• basic knowledge about violence, including laws that

are relevant to victims of intimate partner violence and sexual violence

• knowledge of existing services that may offer

support to survivors of intimate partner violence and sexual violence (this could be in the form of a directory of community services)

• inappropriate attitudes among health-care

providers (e.g. blaming women for the violence, expecting them to leave, etc.), as well as their own experiences of partner and sexual violence