10/03/2022

Reflections from the President

Dear SAVIR Members and Partners,

I was honored to represent SAVIR at the 2^nd Medical Summit on Firearm Injury Prevention, September 10^th and 11^th , 2022 in Chicago, IL. The Summit was hosted by the American College of Surgeons in collaboration with the American College of Physicians, the American College of Emergency Physicians, and the Council of Medical Specialty Societies. This important event was a follow up to 1^st Summit held in 2019 which engaged over 45 major medical and injury prevention organizations in developing initiatives to support firearm injury prevention and 9 official Consensus Statements published in the Proceedings (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31108194/).

“The objectives of the 2022 Summit are: 1) Use a consensus-based, non-partisan approach to selecting recommendations for executive action and/or legislation at the federal, state, and municipal levels that would decrease firearm-related injuries; 2) Identify elements of the most effective programs that can be implemented by physician practices/clinics/hospitals/health systems in partnership with their communities to effectively lower the risk of violence, with an emphasis on marginalized communities that are disproportionately impacted by violence.”

A common theme from the presentations and discussions at the 2022 Summit is firearm injury and violence have become a public health crisis in the United States so we must work together to tackle this crisis. The Medical Summit has a major goal of engaging organizations that represent physicians, nurses, public health professionals, and emergency medical services providers who are at the front line in caring for those who are profoundly affected by violence and injuries. At the Summit, I also heard many key discussions and conversations about establishing partnerships and trust with local communities, advocating for more up stream funding from federal funding agencies, packaging a reasonable business model to C-suite decision makers at hospitals, and short- and long-term violence prevention implementation strategies that could be effectively implemented at hospitals and organizations across the USA.

 SAVIR is a professional organization that provides leadership and fosters excellence in the science of violence and injury prevention and care. I strongly encourage our members who are passionate about violence and firearm injury prevention to play a active role in the national efforts to address this public health crisis. We must work together with other professional organizations, local and national leaders, and communities to find and implement effective violence prevention approaches.

Yours sincerely,

 Henry Xiang, MD, MPH, PhD, MBA