About Us
Our Mission
The Columbia Center for Injury Science and Prevention (CCISP) aims to create and apply “Science in Service to Safety.” The Center will accomplish this through leveraging the unique value of scientific inquiry in assembling a large group of university, community, and government partners around injury and violence strategies with the greatest potential to innovatively impact the safety and health of large populations. The Center will promote and perform innovative, cutting-edge injury research with real-world impact; build a new generation of injury scientists and practitioners in one of the world’s leading training programs; and engage in bidirectional sharing of expertise with policymakers and community partners to meaningfully reduce the burden of injuries and violence. The Center will integrate and sustain these three core activities — research, training, and outreach — to maximize its impact.
The Columbia Center for Injury Science and Prevention is based in the Department of Epidemiology, Mailman School of Public Health, and is funded in part by a grant from the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Our mission is to improve population health by reducing the morbidity and mortality from unintentional and intentional injuries through knowledge creation, dissemination and translation of scientific discoveries, development of innovative and multilevel training and education programs, and promotion of best practices and evidence-based interventions.
Our objectives are to integrate expertise and other resources across academic divisions, facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration, forge diverse and far-reaching partnerships, and accelerate the advancement of science and practice in the injury control field.
Our goals are to create a synergistic and sustainable injury colloquium in a premier research university, strengthen the scientific foundation for the prevention and control of injury and violence, provide scholarly and technical support for researchers, students, practitioners, community groups, health departments, and other stakeholders, foster the development of advanced training and education programs, and promote evidence-based injury reduction strategies and practices for improving population health and safety.
Our specific aims are:
1) to create an administrative structure to provide effective leadership, oversight, mentorship, coordination, and management of the Center, and to leverage financial and human resources and other support for accomplishing the Center’s mission;
2) to expand and operate an effective and sustainable outreach network to facilitate collaboration across public and private sectors, institutions, professional organizations, and community groups, to provide training, research, and other technical services to government agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and other partners, and to translate scientific evidence into public policy and practice guidelines by engaging and educating legislators, decision-makers, and other stakeholders;
3) to develop structured and multilevel training and education programs to provide interdisciplinary and innovative learning opportunities for students, researchers, clinicians, and other professionals; and
4) to establish a portfolio of academic excellence in the areas of injury-related policy evaluation, translational research, and research methodology by conducting cutting-edge research on the causes and outcomes of injuries and multifaceted approaches to reducing the occurrence, and mitigating the consequences, of injuries.