“Uncover”: Intesa Sanpaolo Charity Fund's project for women’s health

The WISH Laboratory is a multidisciplinary research group at the University of Padua that studies the consequences of intimate partner violence (IPV) on women's health, investigating the physiological and molecular mechanisms underlying the damage.

Through our studies, we are beginning to show that chronic exposure to violence can lead to biological damage with severe consequences on health, causing real, lasting and measurable damage. From this evidence, the need arose to transfer the results of preclinical research to studies that directly involve women who have been victims of violence, with the collaboration of the Centro Veneto Progetti Donna [Women’s Projects Centre of the Veneto Region] in Padua and the Centro Antiviolenza Soccorso Violenza Sessuale e Domestica [Sexual and Domestic Violence Assistance Anti-Violence Centre] (SVSeD) of the Policlinico di Milano hospital.

Thanks to the support of the Intesa Sanpaolo Charity Fund, the "UNCOVER" project was born, with the aim of making the results of our research usable by and accessible to all. Its contribution has made it possible to train the operators of anti-violence centres on the cardiovascular and neuropsychological effects of gender violence and to create publicity materials to help schools and citizens to understand, recognise and counteract its effects.

For anti-violence centres, participation in research has a value in scientific and political terms, but also in cultural terms. In fact, the evidence will make it possible to call for greater prevention measures given the great impact that intimate partner violence has on women's bodies and health, making it a public health problem, but also to pay greater attention to the need to develop an increasingly gender-oriented perspective in medicine.