CDC awards $3.6 million to UNC injury center to establish unique violence training program

By DAVID WILLIAMSON
UNC News Services

CHAPEL HILL -- The National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, a part of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has awarded a four-year, $3.68 million cooperative agreement to the University of North Carolina Injury Prevention Research Center.

In collaboration with the UNC School of Public Health’s North Carolina Institute for Public Health, faculty experts will establish the nation’s first injury and violence prevention training program. The new project will be called the National Violence Prevention Leader and Practitioner Training Program. Its goal will be to foster leadership in planning, implementing and evaluating violence prevention efforts.

Dr. Carol W. Runyan, director of the UNC center and professor of health behavior and health education, will serve as principal investigator. Violence, Runyan said, is among the leading causes of injury and premature death in this country overall and is the leading cause of death among certain groups of Americans such as young black males.

"In its report 'Reducing the Burden of Injury,' the Institute of Medicine cited the yawning gap between science and practice in injury and violence prevention as one of the field's greatest challenges," she said. "With implementation of our new program, we aim to close part of that gap and transform the face of violence prevention in the United States.

"This innovative effort will use multiple adult learning strategies including intensive leadership training and coaching and a variety of web and video-based distance education activities for state, local and tribal practitioners to improve leadership in preventing violence against women, youth violence and suicide."

Co-principal investigators, Drs. Wanda M. Hunter, assistant director for teaching and service at IPRC and associate professor of social medicine, and Sandra L. Martin, associate professor of maternal and child health, will assist Runyan.

The team expects the program to reach more than 7,200 people across the country working in injury and violence prevention during its first four years, Runyan said. "Participants will learn basic public health and violence prevention concepts, develop and implement plans, train others, interact with one another and with researchers, coaches and others to enhance leadership training and consulting skills. They also will develop an ongoing network with alumni and faculty."

The planned work builds on a national collaboration that Runyan has chaired for the past three years involving the National Association of Injury Control Research Centers and the State and Territorial Injury Prevention Directors Association to address major gaps in injury control infrastructure nationally.

"By partnering in this proposal with the UNC School of Public Health, we capitalize on one of the most highly sophisticated professional education organizations in public health in the country," Runyan said. "The Management Academy for Public Health, jointly sponsored by the School of Public Health and the Kenan-Flagler Business School, serves as a model for the new training."

Others involved in the new program, all at UNC, include Carol Gunther-Mohr, co-investigator and project director at IPRC; and at the School of Public Health, Drs. Stephen Orton, co-investigator and co-project director; Karl Umble, evaluation consultant; and David Potenziani, director of instructional and information systems.

The UNC Injury Prevention Research Center is a multidisciplinary federally funded center founded in 1987 that brings together faculty experts from numerous other schools and departments at UNC.

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Note: Runyan can be reached at (919) 966-3916 or carol_runyan@unc.edu.

Injury Prevention Research Center Contact: Karen Demby, (919) 843-3530
News Services Contact: David Williamson, 962-8596