Greetings Injury Community:

We had another great Quarterly Meeting this month, thank you for coming and a special thanks to our Summer Scholarship recipients. Looking forward to seeing you all in a more informal setting - ECIC's Holiday Networking Mixer. We had a wonderful time last year and hope you enjoy the food, drinks, and fellowship again! Please see below for more information and updates.  

Quarterly Meeting: November 9, 2012 

• The 2012 Summer Scholarship recipients presented their injury prevention research: Amanda Garcia-Williams (Emory, Public Health PhD) - Factors that predict helping behavior toward a suicidal peer; Derek Jaworski (Georgia State University, Geosciences MA) - Relationship between pedestrian accident frequency and the degree of horizontal and vertical curvature of the road network; Danielle Fincher (Emory, Public Health MPH) - The effect of screening mode on disclosure of intimate partner violence among African American Women at WIC clinics in greater Atlanta; Jackson Bunch (University of Georgia, Sociology PhD) - Offending and violent victimization; and Rosalyn Schroeder (Emory, Public Health MPH) - Health services for survivors of sexual violence in Liberia. Congratulations!

(left to right) Dr. Sheryl Heron, Rosalyn Schroeder, Danielle Fincher, Derek Jaworski, Amanda Garcia-Williams, Jackson Bunch, and Dr. Debra Houry

For more information on ECIC's Summer Student Scholarship Program, please visit our webpage

• Brown Bag Lecture Series: Our first Brown Bag of the academic year was a rousing success - standing room only! Dr. Abigail Hankin-Wei gave an outstanding talk on Social Structure and Serotonin: Understanding the Roots of Violence. The next Brown Bag Lecture will focus on suicide prevention and held in January 2013.

• Social Media Lecture Series: The first Social Media lecture of the series was fantastic with lots of helpful tips. On Nov. 14th, Michael Mumper presented A Social Media Overview: Understanding the Basics, Overcoming Fears and Creating a Community. Don't miss the next 3 lunch time sessions, which focus on specific social media channels.   

• Faculty Mentorship Program: The Mentorship Program began last month with 8 pairs selected to participate in this second, more formalized mentoring process. With 4 schools and 2 organizations represented, we are excited about the energy, engagement and positive outcomes expected from this 7-month program. For information on how the mentor program has changed this year, please visit our website. There are resources posted for your perusal.   

• Visibility: The ECIC has been actively engaged in research this last quarter and we have also sought new ways to disseminate findings from our Center and our collaborative approach. As an example, last month, we participated in the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA) in San Francisco and presented on the "Emory Center for Injury Control: Vision and Priorities for Reducing Violence and Injuries in Vulnerable Populations Across the Lifespan Through Interdisciplinary Collaborations and Comprehensive Evaluation". Last week we hosted a panel at the American Society of Criminology conference in Chicago and presented an overview of ECIC research activities as well as three presentations in a session titled, "Disadvantage, Neighborhood and Interpersonal Violence: Research Underway by Faculty Affiliated with the Emory Center for Injury Control".  If you have ideas and suggestions for where we should submit future presentations and panels please let us know. We are always looking for people who may be interested in spearheading these initiatives and will be glad to support activities that assist us in disseminating our findings and giving the ECIC and its many partners visibility and new opportunities.

• WestJEM: We are still looking for papers for the fourth special issue we are putting together with the Western Journal of Emergency Medicine (WestJEM), a peer-reviewed and open access journal. This year's topic is: Multidisciplinary and Novel Approaches to Injury and Violence Prevention Research. We are inviting original manuscripts presenting research findings related to injury and violence prevention, broadly defined. In particular, we have an interest in research representing disciplines other than public health and medicine, such as communications/ marketing, business, law, psychology, anthropology, and education, though traditional public health and medical research will be accepted.  The ECIC will have complete editorial control over the issue, but manuscripts should still follow the format guidelines outlined by WestJEM. No costs will be incurred by authors included in the special issue. We can publish approximately 12 papers so we encourage you to brush off a paper you've had on your shelf or one that you've needed to finish up and submit it to this special issue.  Links to the three prior issues and submission guidelines are on our webpage.The deadline for submissions is Friday, Dec. 14th with a targeted publication date of Summer/Fall 2013. Please submit your article directly to WestJEM, indicating that it is for the Emory Injury Control issue.

Dr. Monica Swahn  

Georgia's Department of Public Health, Office of Injury Prevention  

• Falls Prevention Awareness Day: The 3rd Annual event was a success. There were close to 100 participants. We received positive feedback from all who attended!

• Older Driver Safety Awareness Week: (December 3-7, 2012) aims to promote understanding of the importance of mobility and transportation to ensuring older adults remain active in the community-shopping, working or volunteering-with the confidence that transportation will not be the barrier to strand them at home.

• New Staff: Please welcome our new and returning staff! Steve Davidson is now a regular employee of DPH after retiring. If you are doing anything in the Jessup area, he is a great contact. Susanne Pickering is an Occupational Therapist and has been hired to implement "Stepping On" - an evidence-based falls prevention program. Carol Irvine will be working with Steve on community coalition-building in Southeast Georgia.

• New Resource: The National Governors Association has announced the launch of a new health policy website: http://statepolicyoptions.nga.org. The site provides information to policymakers "seeking solutions to their common health care problems with innovative approaches that arise from expert analysis and the experience of states in their efforts to improve health care access, affordability and quality." It contains information on prevention and health promotion, including tobacco cessation, obesity and immunizations.

Ms. Lisa Dawson   

ECIC Associate Director of Outreach

Emory's Faculty Office Building  

49 Jesse Hill Jr. Drive SE 

Atlanta, GA 30303

Georgia Department of Public Health's Injury Advisory Committee

10:30 - 11:45AM - Room 101

ECIC Quarterly Meeting

RSVP: vhoward@emory.edu