High-Conflict Divorces May Leave a Decade-Long Mark on Health, Study Finds

Hostile divorces are associated with a lasting increase in the use of healthcare services, suggesting that marital conflict may leave a measurable imprint on long-term health. New research following divorced adults for a decade found that greater animosity between former partners was linked to more prescriptions, doctor visits, and hospital stays.

The study, published in the British Journal of Health Psychology, examined 1,784 people who divorced in Denmark between 2015 and 2017. By combining survey responses with national health registry data, researchers tracked healthcare use from five years before to five years after each legal divorce. The study, titled “Divorce Conflict and Health Across the Divorce Process: A 10-Year Observational Study of Medicine Prescriptions, Primary Care Visits and Hospitalisations,” was conducted by Andreas Nielsen Hald, Gert Martin Hald, and Peter Fallesen.

Conflict Before and After Divorce

Participants completed questionnaires shortly after their divorce to assess the intensity of conflict with their former spouse. The survey measured areas of disagreement, conflict-management strategies, and overall attitudes, including negativity and distrust.

Researchers then linked these conflict scores to detailed records of prescription medications, primary care visits, and hospitalizations. This approach allowed the team to examine how healthcare use changed over time rather than focusing only on the period immediately after the divorce.

Rising Prescriptions and Doctor Visits

The analysis showed that higher levels of divorce conflict were consistently associated with greater medication use. During the five years after divorce, a one-standard-deviation increase in reported conflict was associated with a 28% increase in fully redeemed prescriptions.

Much of this increase involved psycholeptics, a class of medications that includes sleeping pills, sedatives, and anti-anxiety drugs. The researchers suggest that prolonged stress and rumination following a highly conflictual divorce may contribute to sleep disturbances and anxiety symptoms.

Antidepressant use followed a different pattern, increasing primarily during the years leading up to the legal divorce. This finding supports the idea that marital breakdown is often a prolonged process, with psychological distress developing well before the relationship officially ends.

Hospital Stays and Health Risks

Healthcare use increased in several other ways. Individuals involved in high-conflict divorces made more visits to general practitioners, medical specialists, and psychologists, with consultation rates rising about two years before divorce and remaining elevated afterward.

A one-standard-deviation increase in divorce conflict was also associated with a 13% higher likelihood of experiencing at least one overnight hospital admission during the five years after divorce. This association appeared strongest during the period leading up to the divorce, suggesting that the early stages of relationship breakdown may place considerable strain on health.

Limits and Broader Context

The authors emphasize that the study is observational and cannot establish that conflict directly causes health problems. Some individuals may already have physical or psychological conditions that both increase healthcare use and contribute to relationship difficulties.

More frequent contact with healthcare providers may also reflect positive help-seeking behavior rather than worsening health alone. Nevertheless, the persistent differences between people experiencing low- and high-conflict divorces suggest that severe marital conflict is associated with a lasting healthcare burden.

The researchers also note that Denmark's universal healthcare system and relatively straightforward divorce process may reduce some of the negative consequences compared with countries where access to healthcare is more limited and legal proceedings are longer or more expensive.

What Future Research Could Reveal

The authors acknowledge that part of the study period overlapped with the COVID-19 pandemic, which disrupted normal patterns of healthcare use and may have influenced some of the findings. Future research could help separate pandemic-related effects from those associated with divorce.

They also recommend studies incorporating repeated psychological assessments together with biological stress markers, such as cortisol or inflammatory biomarkers, to better understand how prolonged relationship conflict affects the body.

The findings suggest that primary care clinicians may benefit from asking patients about significant relationship stress, particularly when they present with sleep problems, anxiety, or depression. Early referral to counseling, mediation, or other support services may help reduce conflict and potentially lessen some of the long-term health consequences associated with high-conflict divorce.

Article prepared by Victoria Caldwell.