Responding to domestic violence: a coordinated response by a consortium of teaching hospitals. Domestic Violence Task Force, Conference of Boston Teaching Hospitals.

Increasingly, health care providers are recognizing their role in the struggle against domestic violence. Although individual institutions around the country have developed protocols and programs in conjunction with community providers, there has been no unified health care effort. In May 1995, the Conference of Boston Teaching Hospitals (COBTH)--a collaborative body of the 14 academic hospitals and medical centers in the Boston area--formed the COBTH Domestic Violence Task Force. This task force, chaired by the president of Children's Hospital, represents the first time that hospital administrators and clinical staff have joined forces to deal with this issue. Critical to this effort were (1) the recognition that the hospitals have a responsibility to respond to patients as well as employees who are battered, (2) that in order for this work to move forward and become integrated into hospital systems, the involvement of senior medical staff and management is necessary, (3) that training and education must be ongoing and penetrate all levels of staff, and (4) that this work must be collaborative, with hospital staff working across disciplines and with community service providers. This paper outlines the year-long work of this Committee, including specific objectives and recommendations.