The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

Abstract #43323

Catherine W. Barber, MPA¹, Deborah Azrael, PhD², Jenny Hochstadt, MSc¹, David Hemenway, PhD², and Mallory O'Brien, PhD¹. (1) Harvard Injury Control Research Center, Harvard School of Public Health, 677 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115, 617-432-1143, cbarber@hsph.harvard.edu, (2) Health Policy and Management, Harvard University, 677 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115

A prototype for the CDC’s National Violent Death Reporting System is being piloted by twelve state and local organizations across the country as a step toward establishing a national surveillance system for all suicides and homicides and for firearm-related deaths. The Harvard Injury Control Research Center’s NVISS project is coordinating the privately funded pilot. The system is modeled after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s reporting system for motor vehicle deaths and builds on models developed by the Medical College of Wisconsin and other collaborators. Sites abstracted data from coroner/medical examiner reports, death certificates, police records, and crime laboratory reports. Data are stored in an incident-based, relational database that collects information on all victims, suspects, and weapons associated with a fatal incident. The presentation will focus both on results of a data quality evaluation and on the role of intimate partner violence and intimate partner problems in suicides and homicides. Among fatal firearm incidents reported by sites in 2000, in 57% of the cases in which a woman was killed by an intimate partner, the suspect also killed himself. This high rate of suspect suicide was not noted among other homicide types. Suspects in intimate partner shootings were divided in thirds between spouses, lovers, and ex-partners. Among all firearm suicide victims, 22% were noted in the coroner/ME report as experiencing relationship problems, usually divorce or break-up. Results indicate the benefits of a multi-source, incident-based reporting system for exploring the role of intimate partner problems in homicide and suicide.

Learning Objectives: At the end of the session, participants will be able to

• Articulate the basic objectives and methods of sites that are piloting a prototype for the National Violent Death Reporting System
• List three examples of how the NVDRS provides policy-relevant information about violent deaths not provided by existing sources of national data.
• Quantify the extent to which unintentional shooting deaths of one person by another are classified as "homicides" not "accidents" on the death certificate.
• List three ways in which, according to the pilot data, violent deaths perpetrated with a firearm differ from those perpetrated by other means.

Related Web page: nviss.org

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.