Pediatric Emergency Medicine Fellow Connecticut Children's Hartford, Connecticut, United States
Background: Since 2020 firearms are the leading cause of pediatric deaths in the United States. There is a growing body of literature examining pediatric firearm mortality; however, up until recently this research has been restricted due to lack of available funding resulting in limited data sources. Prior to 2020 it has been established that the rates of pediatric gun morbidity and mortality are inverse to stricter state firearm legislation. Given the ongoing surge of child gun deaths it is important to further investigate this association. Objective: The purpose of this study is to examine pediatric firearm mortality and state gun legislation using data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) and Giffords Law Center Scorecard Data from 2018-2021. Variables include victim demographics, including sexual orientation, transgender status; manner of death; weapon characteristics; and state level gun law scores. Study aims are to investigate differences between pediatric firearm deaths in relation to individual state firearm legislation using 1) alphabetically graded Giffords Law Center Scorecards and 2) specific state firearm legislation policies, such as safe storage and child access prevention laws. Design/Methods: NVDRS has a restricted access database (RAD) that contains deidentified, multi-state, case-level data with hundreds of unique variables. CDC approval to access the RAD is in progress. IRB review is pending with anticipated exempt status. An agreement with Giffords Law Center with complete access to gun scorecard data has been secured. Data acquisition and cleaning will be completed by 12/2023. Statistical analyses include: standard descriptive statistics to summarize study population characteristics and pediatric firearm mortality; one-way analysis of variance to analyze state legislative scorecards and pediatric gun deaths; Pearson’s chi-squared test to examine differences between specific firearm legislation policies and firearm mortality. Completion of data analysis is expected by 01/2024.
