The Challenge
Communities facing concentrated social and structural adversity such as challenges securing food, housing, and financial resources are at heightened risk of exposure to and involvement in violence. Chronic violence can be driven by various factors, including toxic stress, unhealthy conflict, impaired cognitive functioning, and poor mental and behavioral health (e.g., anxiety, depression, and substance use disorder). As such, survivors of violence face heightened risk of reinjury and homicide death. Despite the pioneering work of hospital-based violence intervention programs like Healing Hurt People, more work must be done to improve the service provision model and increase survivors’ participation in these programs.
The Project
Through this Emerging Leader Fellowship, Daria Waite will work with Healing Hurt People to enhance understanding of the needs of survivors of violence and their access to services, with the goal of fostering broader utilization of hospital-based violence intervention program (HVIP) services. This project will contribute to the emerging body of literature identifying structural and systemic issues related to HVIPs and the human service systems positioned to address survivors’ pressing challenges. The key goals include: (a) uncovering the enabling and inhibiting factors to survivor engagement and treatment goal achievement; and (b) improving the accessibility and relevance of HHP’s violence intervention approach.
Specifically, this Fellowship will enable Daria to:
- Assess alignment between the expressed needs of people impacted by violence, which have motivated their Healing Hurt People program enrollment, and the organizational partnerships and protocols that staff have developed to address participants’ needs.
- Conduct interviews, analyze data, and interpret findings related to Healing Hurt People’s role within Philadelphia’s violence prevention network, both independently and with key informants via participatory research methods.
- Support the development of presentations and other materials to communicate research findings to key stakeholders and promote cross-system partnership.
