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Study protocol
Evaluation of California's Armed and Prohibited Persons System: study protocol for a cluster-randomised trial
  1. Garen J Wintemute1,
  2. Laurel Beckett2,
  3. Philip H Kass3,
  4. Daniel Tancredi4,
  5. David Studdert5,
  6. Glenn Pierce6,
  7. Anthony A Braga6,
  8. Mona A Wright1,
  9. Magdalena Cerdá1
  1. 1Violence Prevention Research Program, Department of Emergency Medicine, School of Medicine, University of California, Davis, Sacramento, California, USA
  2. 2Department of Public Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of California, Davis, Davis, California, USA
  3. 3Department of Population Health and Reproduction, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, Davis, California, USA
  4. 4Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine, University of California, Davis, Sacramento, California, USA
  5. 5Schools of Medicine and Law, Stanford University, Palo Alto, California, USA
  6. 6School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Garen J Wintemute, Violence Prevention Research Program, Department of Emergency Medicine, School of Medicine, University of California, Davis, Sacramento, CA 95817, USA; gjwintemute{at}ucdavis.edu

Abstract

Background and objective Too little is known about the effectiveness of efforts to prevent firearm violence. Our objective is to evaluate California's Armed and Prohibited Persons System (APPS), a law enforcement intervention that seeks to recover firearms from individuals who purchased them legally but subsequently became prohibited from having access to firearms. Prohibitions usually arise from events suggesting an increased risk for future violence.

Design and study population This group-randomised trial involves approximately 20 000 APPS-eligible individuals in 1041 communities. Randomisation was performed at the community level, to early or later intervention (Group 1 and Group 2, respectively) with stratification by region, population and violent crime rate.

Methods APPS is being implemented by the California Department of Justice. The principal outcome measure is the incidence of arrest for a firearm-related or violent crime. Primary analysis will be on an intention-to-treat basis, comparing individuals in Group 1 and Group 2 communities. Analyses will focus on time to event, using proportional hazards regression with adjustment for the clustered nature of the data and incorporating individual- and community-level characteristics. Secondary analyses will examine the effect of the intervention on an as treated basis, effects on subgroups, and effects on community-wide measures such as crime rates.

Discussion APPS may have a significant impact on risk for future violence among members of its target population. The findings of this study will likely be generalisable and have clear implications for violence prevention policy and practice.

Trial registration number NCT02318732.

https://doi.org/10.1136/injuryprev-2016-042194

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors All authors contributed to the design of the study. GJW drafted the manuscript. All authors provided critical editorial input.

    • Funding This study is funded by grant number 2014-R2-CX-0012, awarded by the National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice; and award number 14-6100 from the California Department of Justice. The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication/programme/exhibition are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Justice.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Ethics approval This study has been approved by the Institutional Review Board of the University of California, Davis (IRB ID 553213-2) and classified as posing minimal risk to study subjects.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; internally peer reviewed.