Intimate-partner and gender-based violence

What it is

Intimate-partner violence is violence by a partner or ex-partner: physical, sexual, psychological, economic or property-related, often with control and isolation. Law 1257 of 2008 defines violence against women as any act or omission that causes a woman death, harm or physical, sexual, psychological, economic or property-related suffering because she is a woman. In health services the doctor may be the first to learn of it: ask in private, believe and support, assess risk, document in detail and activate protection. The medico-legal report serves both the criminal case (domestic violence, injuries, femicide) and protection orders.

Key facts

• Signs: repeated injuries or injuries at different stages, an account that does not explain them, delay in seeking care, a partner who will not leave, physical or depressive symptoms without clear cause.
• Common injuries: head, face and neck, and defence injuries on the forearms; in pregnancy, also the abdomen.
• Non-fatal strangulation can leave few marks: examine and document the neck, voice, swallowing and petechiae.
• WHO first-line support (LIVES): listen, inquire about needs, validate, enhance safety and support.
• Penal Code, art. 229: domestic violence, with a higher penalty if the victim is a woman, a child or an older person; it also covers separated spouses or partners.
• Law 1257, art. 8: the victim may consent or not to the medico-legal exam in sexual violence, choose the examiner's sex and decide whether to face the aggressor.

Step by step

1. Ask in private, without the partner or relatives present, with direct, non-judgemental questions.
2. Listen, believe and validate: the violence is not the fault of the person who suffers it.
3. Assess risk: escalation, death threats, weapons, strangulation, pregnancy, intense jealousy, recent separation.
4. Examine and document each injury with measurements, diagrams and, with consent, photographs.
5. Make a safety plan with the person and explain the pathway: family commissioner, Fiscalía, helplines.
6. Refer to mental health and social work, and schedule follow-up.

Next step: what to do and document

• Record in the clinical notes the verbatim account, who the person says was the aggressor, the injuries and the risk assessment.
• If there is sexual violence, apply the protocol of Resolution 459 of 2012.
• Tell the victim of the right to request a protection order from the family commissioner (Law 294 of 1996, art. 4).
• Notify the public health surveillance system and inform the authorities when the law requires it (see mandatory reporting).
• If the risk is high, do not discharge without a safe place: activate protection at once.
• Official text checked on 2026-11-05 at funcionpublica.gov.co.

Legal framework in Colombia

• Law 1257 of 2008: defines violence against women (art. 2) and the types of harm (art. 3), victims' rights (art. 8) and health measures (arts. 13 and 19).
• Law 294 of 1996, art. 4 (as worded by art. 16 of Law 1257 of 2008): protection order from the family commissioner or, failing that, the municipal civil or general court.
• Penal Code, art. 229 (amended by Law 1959 of 2019): domestic violence; art. 104A (added by Law 1761 of 2015): femicide.
• Law 906 of 2004, art. 74, paragraph: no victim's complaint is needed in violence against women.

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Elsewhere in DurgiPedia

• Mandatory reporting: public health, violence and abuse
• The limits of confidentiality: duty to warn and legal disclosure

Connections

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Educational content on forensic and legal medicine; not legal advice and no substitute for the technical guides of Colombia's National Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences. Laws change: each page links the official text and says when it was last checked. For a real case, follow the guide in force and ask the competent authority.

Sources: Ley 1257 de 2008, violencia y discriminación contra las mujeres (Función Pública, Gestor Normativo, 2008); Ley 599 de 2000, Código Penal (arts. 104A y 229) (Función Pública, Gestor Normativo, 2000); Ley 906 de 2004, Código de Procedimiento Penal (art. 74) (Función Pública, Gestor Normativo, 2004); Violence against women (fact sheet) (World Health Organization, 2026); Caring for women subjected to violence: a WHO curriculum for training health-care providers (World Health Organization, 2019).

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