Question: In women victims of sexual assault, how effective are psychological/specialist interventions, compared to no specialist intervention, in improving patient outcomes?

Answer:

 Plain language summary

There is limited high quality evidence that looks into psychological interventions for women victims of sexual assault in adulthood. More research is needed to adequately assess the effectiveness of psychological/specialist interventions in this area.

Clinical and research implications

There is limited, poor quality evidence that psychological interventions, particularly group interventions (e.g. cognitive processing therapy, assertion training, supportive psychotherapy, image rehearsal therapy) may be effective in reducing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, in women who have experienced sexual assault. However, much of the evidence was derived from adult female survivors of childhood sexual abuse or from mixed populations which included women who had experiences rape in childhood or adulthood; this evidence therefore have limited applicability to adult victims of sexual assault.

High quality randomised controlled trials of standardised interventions are needed to adequately assess the effectiveness of psychological interventions for women victims of sexual assault. Studies focussing on women who have experienced sexual assault in adulthood, rather than those who experienced sexual abuse in childhood, are particularly lacking.

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