Patients of gun violence vs others

Nurses General Nursing

Published

In light of recent shooting incidents, I feel like if there is anyone who can have the most influence on the gun issue, you guys are because you are directly involved with patients.

In your experience, how many patients you usually take care of are victims of gun violence? Are there more or less of them compared to victims of natural causes, traffic accidents, and domestic violence?

Thank you, everyone.

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.

It depends. Nursing is specialized and the only time I've taken care of patients who were victims of gun shot wounds was when I worked as a staff RN in a Level I Trauma ED and in their SICU. Consequently, some healthcare providers and nurses working in such fields tend to be outspoken advocates against our current gun laws among other issues such as motorcycle and car safety.

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1 minute ago, juan de la cruz said:

It depends. Nursing is specialized and the only time I've taken care of patients who were victims of gun shot wounds was when I worked as a staff RN in a Level I Trauma ED and in their SICU. Consequently, some healthcare providers and nurses working in such fields tend to be outspoken advocates against our current gun laws among other issues such as motorcycle and car safety.

But in order to be outspoken on the issue, you need some data, don't you? Are you able to see statistics on the number of victims of gun shot wounds compared to others in your experience?

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Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.

We saw a lot but I don't have numbers as this was years ago. The hospital was in an inner city with lots of gang-related violence. Trauma Centers submit their data to a national repository...that's a good start if you want data.

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12 minutes ago, juan de la cruz said:

We saw a lot but I don't have numbers as this was years ago. The hospital was in an inner city with lots of gang-related violence. Trauma Centers submit their data to a national repository...that's a good start if you want data.

Thank you. I hope trauma specialty nurses can give me some insights. I am curious about this when I saw Neil Degrass Tyson's data about victims of gun shot compared to other causes. Assuming that he is correct, I think nurses in trauma specialty and ICU may have better perspective.

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Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.

In Afghanistan? All the time. In the US? MVCs outnumber GSWs.

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Specializes in Vents, Telemetry, Home Care, Home infusion.

Its been 25 years since I worked in an urban community hospital caring for telemetry and respiratory/vent dependent patients. Still have memories of a 16yo male shot in the head with brain material oozing from his missing eye socket, doctors unable to save him, dying quietly one Sunday on my shift while I was doing wound care. Due to the high rates gun violence in Philadelphia during 80's, trauma centers created and focused on violence prevention. Gunshot victims bypassed my facility, taken to PENN Trauma Center 20 blocks away.

PENN Medicine News January 23, 2019

One-Third of Gun Injuries in America Are Treated in Non-Trauma Centers

Quote

Of the roughly 74,000 emergency department visits for gunshot injuries in the United States every year, a third are treated in community hospitals that are not trauma centers, according to new research published today in JAMA Surgery. While public health efforts to better understand gun violence in the United States have increased, until now there has been relatively limited research on non-fatal gun injuries, which far outnumber fatal injuries, and where patients are treated. The recent availability of nationally representative data from over 900 U.S. hospitals allows researchers to better understand the injuries that are seen in the emergency department, and their causes and outcomes. The study, from researchers at Penn Medicine, could help inform hospitals’ efforts to reduce future, gun-related injuries in their communities....

...Among trauma centers in the United States, only 25 have established hospital-based violence intervention programs aimed at preventing recurrent firearm injuries – which occur in about one in 10 patients. These programs have shown not only to lower non-fatal injuries and saves lives, but also cut down on health care costs....

..Most of the firearm injuries in the study pool were due to assault/violence (49 percent) followed by unintentional injury (36 percent) and self-harm (5 percent). The researchers also found that only one out of five firearm injuries were assault injuries admitted to trauma centers....

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22 minutes ago, NRSKarenRN said:

Its been 25 years since I worked in an urban community hospital caring for telemetry and respiratory/vent dependent patients. Still have memories of a 16yo male shot in the head with brain material oozing from his missing eye socket, doctors unable to save him, dying quietly one Sunday on my shift while I was doing wound care. Due to the high rates gun violence in Philadelphia during 80's, trauma centers created and focused on violence prevention. Gunshot victims bypassed my facility, taken to PENN Trauma Center 20 blocks away.

PENN Medicine News January 23, 2019

One-Third of Gun Injuries in America Are Treated in Non-Trauma Centers

Thank you for your stats.

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Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4700838/ - not terribly old, seems relevant.

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37 minutes ago, Pixie.RN said:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4700838/ - not terribly old, seems relevant.

Wow, what I see on the news is the most tragic, but there os other underreported gun related violence, too.

This is why I think only nurses can confirm the total victims of firearm violence. Death toll is easy to find, but injuries may be more difficult to gather data from.

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Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.
17 minutes ago, vetpharmtech said:

Wow, what I see on the news is the most tragic, but there os other underreported gun related violence, too.

This is why I think only nurses can confirm the total victims of firearm violence. Death toll is easy to find, but injuries may be more difficult to gather data from.

No, nurses would only provide anectdotal evidence at best. I am not in a trauma center 24x7x365.

To clarify: I have recent trauma experience which included working with trauma data and national reporting. While I and many nurses can tell plenty of sad stories, that isn't necessarily the complete picture.

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