Duke Orthopaedics Partners with City of Durham on Gun Violence Prevention
The Durham Impact Project will work with local barber shops for community insights
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DURHAM, N.C. – The Duke Orthopaedic Trauma Section is partnering with the City of Durham for the launch of the Durham Impact Project, a gun violence prevention program. The program will work with a coalition of local barbershops to form focus groups aimed at connecting vulnerable community members with existing resources.
The program plans to engage the community through events focused on addressing preventive health topics and community needs such as food insecurity. They also plan to partner with the existing Violence Recovery Program at Duke University Hospital which supports victims of gun violence.
Program organizers hope that by creating community trust through various channels, they’ll be able to touch lives and curb violence.
“As orthopaedic trauma surgeons, we are commonly the people at the end of an incident trying to help the patient recover from bone fractures after gun violence,” said program lead, Malcolm DeBaun, M.D., assistant professor in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at Duke University School of Medicine.
“Oftentimes I see many young males, even teenagers, who are victims of gun violence, almost like in sequence where you'll have one or two or three throughout the weekend in a way that's clustered, much like an infectious disease,” DeBaun said. “We want to be part of the solution, starting with leveraging existing resources within Duke Health and the Durham community.”
“This is a first-of-its-kind effort to develop a cross-sector collaboration to address gun violence as a public health issue and improve social drivers of health in our most vulnerable communities,” said Durham Mayor Leonardo Williams. “Partnership and collaboration are essential to our ability to serve Durham residents.”
DeBaun said preventing violence would not only improve health and well-being, it could also help save an estimated $1.2 million a year in state costs related to gun violence hospitalizations.
Local community organizer and barber, Len Lilly, said he is excited to partner with the program, and he emphasized the importance of creating an environment in the barbershop where vulnerable youth can express themselves and connect with role models who encourage healthier choices.
“People come and talk in barber shops,” Lilly said. “It’s a networking system. If every part of town, or every community barbershop, is connected to maybe a few hundred people who are also connected to a few hundred more people, you create a chain reaction. We have to invest in these kids because they’re the future.”
Seed funding for this program was provided by Johnson & Johnson MedTech.