Lay summary
Intimate partner violence is a key determinant of ill-health poorly recognised at policy and practice levels within the New Zealand health system. Primary care professionals are uniquely positioned to provide early intervention and primary prevention, yet the sector continues to be underutilised in the work to reduce violence within families and whānau. Rather than developing prescriptive guidelines, our innovative complexity informed participatory health research will work alongside primary care professionals and community in deliberative dialogue workshops to generate multiple and alternative pathways that make it easier to be responsive to intimate partner violence. We employ mixed methods to capture practice change in real time, allowing for continuous learning and system adjustments. This study improves primary care responsiveness to intimate partner violence, interrupting trajectories to ill health.