# Evaluating outcomes for youth receiving hospital-based violence prevention with and without a community-level initiative

> **NIH ALLCDC K01** · VIRGINIA COMMONWEALTH UNIVERSITY · 2020 · $125,000

## Abstract

Project Summary
The consequences of youth violence have a massive financial toll on society, as well as long-term psychosocial
and physical effects on the victim and communities. Perpetrators of violence also face many challenges, such
as problems with mental and physical health, school performance, employment, and engaging and maintaining
healthy relationships. Without a doubt, youth violence has a tremendous impact on everyone involved.
Fortunately, youth violence is a preventable epidemic. Yet, high-risk youth are often difficult to reach and engage
in prevention strategies. A solution to this problem is hospital-based violence prevention. Each day over 1,300
youths are admitted to the emergency department for violence-related injuries. This traumatic event can serve
as a powerful precipitant for change. Hospital-based violence prevention programs, such as Bridging the Gap
(BTG), capitalize on this catalyst and engage these high-risk youth. Unfortunately, many of these youths come
from impoverished communities, where resources are low, protective factors are sparse, and community-levels
of violence are high. Without a community-level prevention strategy, hospital-based violence prevention
programs may be limited in keeping youth from engaging in violence once they leave the hospital. Thus, it may
be that an integrative approach is the best strategy for cross-cutting violence prevention for high-risk violently
injured youth. Using a sample of 120 violently injured youth (12-17 years) recruited from Virginia Commonwealth
University Trauma Center (VCUTC), we aim to evaluate if BTG youth have greater reductions in multiple forms
violence when the youth comes from a community receiving Communities that Care Prevention System and
Walker-Talker/Plain Talk Community Engagement Model (BTG+CTC Plus) versus BTG youth from communities
without CTC Plus. Also, we aim to evaluate the economic efficiency of BTG and BTG+CTC Plus using
surveillance data. Lastly, we aim to test the presence and strength of mediators that may link early adversities
to violent behavior for youth who receive BTG in communities with CTC Plus as compared to youth who receive
BTG in communities without CTC Plus. To achieve these aims, the candidate and mentorship team (Drs. Sullivan
and Farrell) have developed a comprehensive training plan outlining a series of training and research goals.
These goals include training in risk/protective factors for multiple forms of violence, hospital-and community-
based violence programs, program evaluation, and economic efficiency evaluation. This K01 proposal will
capitalize on the existing expertise of the candidate. The research represents an important contribution towards
understanding what works for cross-cutting violence prevention in violently injured youth. The institutional
environment is recognized by the CDC as an Academic Center of Excellence in Youth Violence Prevention, and
the mentors have shown longstanding success mentoring and imp...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10022287
- **Project number:** 5K01CE003160-02
- **Recipient organization:** VIRGINIA COMMONWEALTH UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Nicholas David Thomson
- **Activity code:** K01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** ALLCDC
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $125,000
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-09-30 → 2021-09-29

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10022287

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10022287, Evaluating outcomes for youth receiving hospital-based violence prevention with and without a community-level initiative (5K01CE003160-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10022287. Licensed CC0.

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