The US National Violent Death Reporting System: domestic and international lessons for violence injury surveillance
- 1Center for Injury Research and Control, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
- 2Cisalva Institute, Universidad del Valle, Cali, Colombia
- 3Research Centre for Injury Studies, Flinders University, Adelaide, SA, Australia
- 4Medical Research Council and University of South Africa, Tygerberg, South Africa
- Correspondence to: Dr H Weiss Center for Injury Research and Control University of Pittsburgh 200 Lothrop Street Suite B400 Pittsburgh, PA 15237, USA hw{at}injurycontrol.com
- Accepted 21 September 2006
Abstract
Objectives: This article reviews and comments on the development, strengths and limitations of the US National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) from a variety of domestic and international perspectives.
Methods: The authors were provided preliminary copies of the manuscripts in this special edition and examined them to understand and put in context the elements and uses of the NVDRS so far. Their comments are based on their reading and interpretation of these papers plus their own combined experience in injury and public health surveillance from four different countries: the US, Colombia, Australia, and South Africa.
Results: The NVDRS is bigger than the sum of its parts because it links existing data from multiple sources. Its adoption of modern relational database technologies offers advantages over traditional injury surveillance databases and creates new opportunities for understanding, collaboration, and partnerships. Challenges include overcoming resource limitations so that it can become a truly national system, measuring and improving its sensitivity and comparability, and the need to examine mortality in context with serious non-fatal violent events.
Conclusions: The NVDRS is an important work in progress for the US. Each country should examine its own needs, traditions, resources, and existing infrastructure when deciding what kind of violence surveillance system to develop. However, collaboration in developing common definitions and classifications provides an important foundation for international comparisons.
- NVDRS, National Violent Death Reporting System
- CDC, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
- NCIPC, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control
- FARS, Fatality Analysis Reporting System
- NHTSA, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
- NVISS, National Violent Injury Surveillance System
- CODES, Crash Outcome Data Evaluation System
- ICD, International Classification of Disease
- WHO, World Health Organization
Footnotes
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↵* William Farr, for example, made “diseases that are the direct result of violence” one of the five primary groups in his influential classification of diseases in the middle of the nineteenth century (Humphreys NA (ed): Vital statistics:a memorial volume of selections from the reports and writings of William Farr. London: Sanitary Institute, 1885:254–5. Reprinted for the New York Academy of Medicine by the Scarecrow Press, Inc, Metuchen, NJ, 1975)).
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This work was supported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Grant No #CCU323155.
The findings and conclusions in this report are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
