Around the country, print, broadcast and online media outlets are covering the groundbreaking work of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) leaders, scholars, fellows and grantees. Some recent examples:

RWJF Clinical Scholars program alumnus Arthur Kellerman, MD, MPH, FACEP, was quoted in a Washington Post story on the Obama Administration's push to renew federal funding for public health research on gun violence. Language initially included in a 1996 appropriations bill has, he said, "virtually stopped good public health science on [gun research] for the last 10 to 15 years.” White House lawyers recently concluded that the law doesn’t prohibit such research. Kellermann, also an alumnus of the RWJF Health Policy Fellows program, co-authored an article on the subject in the Journal of the American Medical Association with Clinical Scholars alumnus Frederick Rivara, MD, MPH.

RWJF Health & Society Scholars Program Director and Health Policy Fellows alumna Jo Ivey Boufford, MD, was also in the news discussing gun violence. Boufford wrote an op-ed that appeared in the Idaho Statesman and Long Island, New York's Newsday, about the public health effects of gun violence. “As a society, we address public health threats by identifying the root causes, reducing exposure, and instituting protective measures…  In the same way, we must protect Americans from irresponsible gun use,” she writes.

A study by RWJF Investigator Awards in Health Policy Research recipients Jason Schnittker, PhD, and Chris Uggen, PhD, finds that incarceration increases the risk of mood disorders such as major depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, and dysthymia after release. That, in turn, is strongly related to disability and increased incidence of substance abuse and impulse control disorders. United Press International, Medical Xpress and Science Day are among the outlets to report on the findings. Read an RWJF Human Capital Blog post about the study.

Manish K. Sethi, MD, is a health policy associate at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Center for Health Policy at Meharry Medical College and a Pilot Project Mini-Grant recipient and renowned orthopaedic trauma surgeon at Vanderbilt University’s Orthopaedic Institute Center for Health Policy. Sethi spoke this morning during the 2012-2013 Grand Rounds Series, sponsored by Meharry Medical College School of Medicine, on “Gun Violence in Nashville: Working Towards Community Based Solutions.”

Human Capital Blog: What is the violence prevention program you’re directing with the RWJF Center for Health Policy at Meharry?

Sethi: We are doing a youth violence intervention program via partnership with Nashville schools funded by the RWJF Center for Health Policy at Meharry.

All of the data demonstrates that educational intervention with this age group demonstrates positive results. Currently, no such program exists in Nashville schools.

HCB: What drove your interest in this topic?

Sethi: I am a trauma surgeon and have been seeing an inordinate number of gun violence injuries in African American teenagers. I grew up in Tennessee and left for my medical training, but during childhood I never saw violence to this degree. Almost every week I see a teenager who either loses his life, or suffers major trauma secondary to a gun violence injury. I care very deeply about the future of these children and of Tennessee and I just feel that we have to do something.

Around the country, print, broadcast and online media outlets are covering the groundbreaking work of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) leaders, scholars, fellows and grantees. Some recent examples:

Zachary Goldberger, MD, an RWJF Clinical Scholar, spoke to the New York Times about a study he led that examined the ideal amount of time to continue cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) on patients in cardiac arrest. “The study found that patients have a better chance of surviving in hospitals that persist with CPR for just nine minutes longer, on average, than hospitals where efforts are halted earlier,” the story reports.  First published in The Lancet, the study is one of the first to link the duration of CPR efforts with survival rates.  It is expected to prompt hospitals to reconsider their protocols.

RWJF Health & Society Scholar Jason Houle, PhD, continues to receive media coverage for his study that finds students from middle-income families leave school with an average of $6,000 more in student loan debt than their lower-income peers. The students were also more likely to have more student loan debt than their higher-income peers. Among the outlets to report on the findings: United Press International, Bloomberg Business Week, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and the Wisconsin State Journal.

A study supported by the RWJF Interdisciplinary Nursing Quality Research Initiative (INQRI) finds that “when nurses take steps to intervene in the medication process, they are more likely to catch would-be errors before they reach the patient,” Fierce Healthcare reports. The findings also indicate that a supportive practice environment is associated with a higher quality of nursing care. Read more about the study.

Around the country, print, broadcast and online media outlets are covering the groundbreaking work of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) leaders, scholars, fellows and grantees. Some recent examples:

Technically Philly reports that, after organizing “Game Solutions for Health,” in which students competed to build the best mobile heath tool, RWJF Nurse Faculty Scholars alumna Nancy Hanrahan, PhD, RN, CS, FAAN, will now lead a technology and innovation lab and related course at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. Read a post Hanrahan wrote for the RWJF Human Capital Blog about Game Solutions for Health.

Not getting enough sleep after receiving a vaccination could reduce vaccine effectiveness, according to a study by RWJF Health & Society Scholar Aric Prather, PhD. “People who slept less than six hours per night were nearly 12 times more likely to be left unprotected by the vaccine than those who slept more than seven hours per night,” because their immune systems produced fewer antibodies in response to the vaccine, Health Day reports.

RWJF Clinical Scholar Comilla Sasson, MD, MS—an emergency room physician at the University of Colorado Hospital—spoke to Colorado Public Radio about caring for, and following up with, the victims of the mass shooting in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado.

By Jooyoung Lee, PhD, assistant professor of sociology at the University of Toronto and a 2009 – 2011 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health & Society Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania

Ervin is a black Rastafarian. He has a calm and easy-going demeanor, something that he attributes to growing up in a small Jamaican village near Kingston.  On most days, Ervin rolls his long set of locks into a beehive that he conceals beneath brightly colored turbans.

He was one of the first gunshot victims that I met while conducting ethnographic research in Philadelphia.  On a chilly Friday in January, Ervin hobbled into the trauma clinic at The University of Pennsylvania.  His work boots were covered with tufts of snow and his puffy winter jacket hid a lean and muscular 35-year old body. 

When I first introduced myself and the purpose of my study, Ervin smiled from ear-to-ear.  He was anxious to tell his story and gave me a detailed play-by-play of how he had been shot twice in the legs—both 9mm bullets had been retained and were causing him great discomfort and pain.

Although he was nearly a year removed from his shooting, Ervin spoke openly about recurrent nightmares, trouble sleeping at night, and described feeling frightened by loud noises in his neighborhood—some of which were “false alarms” and others which were gunshots fired near his home.  Although I am a sociologist by training and have never been trained in counseling or psychotherapy, my gut told me that Ervin was suffering from post-traumatic stress symptoms. 

A couple weeks later, I visited Ervin at his home.  During my visit, I asked Ervin if he had ever spoken to a mental health professional about his trauma.  He shook his head and explained that he knew of free mental health services in Philadelphia, but could not afford to go.  As a day laborer, Ervin relied on landscaping, construction, and other manual labor that often required him to be ready for work at a moment’s notice.  He explained, “If they call me and I’m at some office, I might lose a job that could be the only one I get for a few weeks.”