Caught in the Crossfire

By Katherine Susman | Categories: | Comments Off on Caught in the Crossfire

Youth ALIVE! – CBO
Eden Medical Center, Children’s Hospital Oakland – referral partners
Alameda County Emergency Medical Services – Funder
City of Oakland – Funder

In 1993, Sherman Spears, a paraplegic former gunshot victim working at local CBO Youth ALIVE!, began visiting young GSW victims at the Oakland hospital where he had been treated. This became Caught in the Crossfire, the first hospital-based violence intervention program – now a national model.

The program serves youth and adult survivors of intentional injury (gunshot, stab wound and physical assault) with immediate response upon hospital treatment in the golden moment when the patient is open to long-term support. Continuing post-discharge for 6-12 months, trained intervention specialists from the peer community of the patients will provide case management, mentoring, linkage to mental health and services, safety assessment/retaliation prevention, and other services in the field/community in order to prevent retaliation and reinjury and in order to promote physical, social and emotional healing from trauma.

This program coordinates with hospital Administration, Social Services and Trauma to access patient records, coordinate hospital access to visit patients, and to communicate about follow-up care.

Programs are measured by positive outcomes such as attachment to mental health services, education/employment and housing and reduction in negative outcomes such as arrests and injury recidivism. Without intervention, nationally, up to 44% of patients recidivate within 5 years. In our program, it is less than 3%.