Member Update
September, 2011

Dear SAVIR Members, 

As summer comes to an end, I hope you are rested and refreshed having had some vacation or “staycation”.  SAVIR has not been on vacation as you’ll see from these exciting highlights of the past few months.

New Cooperative Agreement Funded with Safe States Alliance

We were successful in receiving a 5 year cooperative agreement from NCIPC to evaluate the states’ Core Violence and Injury Prevention Programs. SAVIR will be responsible for convening an Evaluation Expert Panel (EEP) that will provide advice and direction to the evaluation. I will serve as Co-PI with Amber Williams, Executive Director of Safe States Alliance (SSA). Julie Gibbs will provide administrative oversight and coordination for SAVIR’s responsibilities on the project. We greatly appreciate those of you who wrote letters of support for the application. I’m sure that strong selling points for the proposal were the expertise reflected by our membership and our successful past collaborations with Safe States Alliance. We look forward to your input on the project as the plans for the work, which will be done in close collaboration with the NCIPC, unfold.

Safe States Alliance will be hiring two positions with funding from this grant including a Project Director and an Evaluation Specialist. For more information about these positions, please visit www.safestates.org.

Conference a Big Success

The evaluations have been tallied by SSA for our joint Progress through Partnerships conference in Iowa. There were a total of 337 attendees and 35% responded to the survey; 48% of respondents were SSA members only, 21% were SAVIR members only, 10% were members of both, and 21% were members of neither organization. Most people attended for networking purposes (79%) or to obtain the latest information about research (68%) and practice (62%).  Overall impressions of the conference were extremely positive (e.g., > 90% agreed that the meeting met their expectations and educational needs). While there were lots of good suggestions about specific aspects of the conference, 97% said they would recommend future joint meetings to others. Finally, the conference was a boon to SAVIR’s financial health, bringing in > $40,000 in revenue. We are currently in discussions with SSA regarding our 2013 conference and more to follow on that. We would welcome member input!

The conference was also the venue for completing our NCIPC Contract to Promote the Research Agenda. In an effort to continue the promotion of the Research Agenda, CDC contracted with SAVIR to conduct three Round Table sessions at the conference. These successful sessions included Violence Prevention, Unintentional Injury, and Injury Response. The final report, which has been submitted to NCIPC, includes detailed notes from the sessions about how to move forward on research in each of these areas. Thanks to Shannon Frattaroli and Julie Gibbs for their leadership and hard work on this initiative. 

Congressional Briefing and Hill Visits Bring together Researchers and Practitioners in Support of NCIPC

SAVIR co-hosted a successful Injury Prevention Congressional Briefing. The event was organized in partnership with The Campaign for Public Health Foundation (CPH) and several national injury and violence prevention groups, including the Safe States Alliance, the National Athletic Trainers Association, and Safe Kids USA. Video clips from the briefing are available on You Tube.   Briefing panelists included:

• Dr. Linda C. Degutis, Director of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• Dr. Carolyn Fowler, Assistant Professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing and the Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy
• Meri-K Appy, President, Safe Kids USA

Additionally, the CPH Foundation has released a new fact sheet on injury which can be found here.

In conjunction with the briefing, SAVIR was part of a collaboration of injury and violence prevention stakeholder groups who met with Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin and Assistant Secretary of Health Dr. Howard Koh. Organized by Safe States Alliance, the meeting’s purpose was to express support for the newly released National Prevention Strategy, an evidence-based guide for cross sector collaboration in improving the nation’s health. One of the Strategy’s main priorities is Injury-Free Living. The group discussion highlighted opportunities for collaboration.  Participants emphasized the importance of injury and violence research, and expressed support for the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.  Dr. Benjamin and Dr. Koh were extremely receptive and supportive of our efforts, and we look forward to further opportunities for collaboration.  

Contract from NCIPC to Create Evaluation Indicators for the ICRC Program Completed  

Thanks to the leadership of Carol Runyan and Mariana Garretson and the contributions of the SAVIR workgroup that included Jeffrey Coben, Joel Fein, Julie Gibbs, Deborah Houry, Monica Valvala, Jingzhen (Ginger) Yang, and myself.  We successfully produced 11 indicator topics that can be used as metrics to assess the contributions of the overall Injury Control Research Center (ICRC) program and monitor the progress of individual centers.  The final report has been submitted to NCIPC and included recommendations for implementation and implementation issues that need to be considered.  Thank you to all of you who contributed to the work either through commenting, being interviewed, or participating in the focus groups that were held at the Iowa conference.

Check out Two New Resources

Thanks to the Advocacy and Policy Committee, we now have two new tools that should be helpful to our members’ advocacy efforts. The first is a new feature on our website – Research Matters – which will also be available as a fact sheet. This document highlights examples of injury research with high impact that were culled from the literature by the Science Committee. The second is a fact sheet on NCIPC’s Injury Control Research Center program, focused on its impact on the field and why it needs to be fully supported. 

New, Improved SAVIR Website Needs Social Media Expertise

SAVIR is in the process of re-vitalizing our website. The goal is a more user-friendly site with increased access for our members.  We plan to take advantage of the latest technology to further our mission of promoting educational and scholarly activity among our members.  To accomplish this goal we are forming a social media committee and are looking for volunteers to help with this effort. If you are interested please contact our administrator, Julie Gibbs at admin@savirweb.org. 

NCIPC 20^th Anniversary Planning Seeks SAVIR Input

2012 marks the 20^th anniversary of the NCIPC and planning is underway for a series of events throughout the year. Rita Noonan is heading up the planning and has organized a stakeholders’ work group to help with the planning. I am representing SAVIR on the work group and would greatly appreciate hearing any ideas you may have for activities you’d like to see undertaken next year.

Participate in SAVIR Elections

Thank you for submitting your nominations for the SAVIR Board of Directors elections.  The SAVIR Board has a vital role in our organization in voting on important organizational issues confronting SAVIR, advising the President, and charting the course for SAVIR.  Your vote is important; please look for the election ballot in late September.

As always, we welcome your comments, suggestions and active participation in SAVIR. An engaged membership is the secret of success and sustainability!

Best Regards,
Andrea Gielen

REMEMBER TO SUPPORT OUR MEMBER SCHOLARSHIP CHALLENGE

“As a first generation college graduate who held multiple jobs to fund my undergraduate and master’s degrees, I appreciate the value of educational opportunities and understand the economic challenges facing students.  This is why I believe the Brooks Webb Student Award is so important.  I'm willing to back my beliefs with cash and I challenge my friends in SAVIR to do the same.  I will donate $500 to the Brooks Webb Student Award each year that at least $500 is donated by the general SAVIR membership.  Help me provide opportunities to the future leaders of our field” –

            Dawn Comstock, Center for Injury Research and Policy, Nationwide Children's     Hospital, Columbus, OH.