Exploratory Research Projects
The exploratory research projects funds short-term, preliminary research projects conducted by new researchers entering the field of injury control, and experienced injury researchers taking novel and creative approaches to existing research problems.
Exploratory research projects are chosen through a competitive peer-review process. The Columbia Center for Injury Science and Prevention partners with the Implementation Science Institute of the Irving Institute for Clinical and Translational Research (CTSA) to select exploratory project recipients through their Intervention and Implementation Science Pilot Award opportunities.
This is a capacity-building opportunity to stimulate the development, testing, and implementation of innovative interventions.
Current and recent projects include:
Spatial and Psychological Factors for Suicidality and Self-Harm in Transgender Women
Principal Investigator: Dr. Liadh Timmins (former Post Doctorate Fellow mentored by Dr. Dustin Duncan, Associate Professor of Epidemiology
This was the first exploratory project supported by the Center in 2019-2020. The study seeks to accomplish the following three specific aims:
1. Test the acceptability of a spatial and psychological research protocol for suicidality and self-harm in 100 transgender women. Participants will be recruited for a brief survey to complete a draft battery of questionnaires to be used in future research on this topic, as well as specific questions on the acceptability of these questions, their perceptions of the importance of this topic and their comfort with our protocol.
2. Generate preliminary prevalence estimates of suicidality, self-harm, and psychological (e.g. internalized transphobia, rumination) and spatial factors (e.g. distance from transition-related care, neighborhood poverty) in transgender women in NYC. Data from the brief survey will be used to generate estimates of the prevalence between the variables in the conceptual framework in order to determine which are the main priority for further examination in the NIHMD-funded research project and so that more precise power analyses can be conducted.
3. Generate preliminary magnitude estimates of the associations between suicidality, self-harm, and psychological and spatial in transgender women in NYC. These data will be used to generate estimates of the relationships between the variables in the conceptual framework, again to determine which are the main priority for further examination in the NIHMD-funded research project and to perform precise power analyses for this project.
Adapting the Suicide Safety Planning Intervention for Delivery to Adolescents in Mozambique Primary Care Settings
Principal Investigator: Dr. Kathryn Lovero, Assistant Professor of Sociomedical Sciences, Mailman School of Public Health
A recipient of a 2020-2021 Intervention and Implementation Science Pilot Award.
In the present study, we will use a community-based participatory research approach13,14 to adapt and pilot test SPI for adolescents (SPI-A) delivered by non-specialists in Mozambican primary care. Specifically, our goals are:
Aim 1: To contextually and culturally adapt the Safety Planning Intervention for Mozambican adplescents in primary care settings.
Aim 2: To evaluate feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary effectiveness of SPI-A delivered in Mozambican primary care.
Lock and Protect: Reducing Adolescent Access to Lethal Means for Suicide
Principal Investigator: Dr. Ashley Blanchard, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics (in Emergency Medicine) at Columbia University Medical Center
Suicide is the second leading cause of death in adolescents in the United States. Emergency Departments (EDs) capture an underserved population at high risk for suicide and provide an important but typically missed opportunity for adolescent suicide prevention. Providing lethal means reduction counseling in EDs may be an effective method to prevent suicide and suicide attempts in adolescents. The experienced research team has developed an ED-centric, tablet-based decision aid, Lock and Protect, that counsels parents and guardians on lethal means reduction and methods to appropriately supervise adolescents at risk for suicide.
Aim 1. Determine the acceptability and feasibility of implementing the Lock and Protect decision aid and the feasibility of conducting a future trial in the ED among parents whose adolescents are at risk of suicide.
Aim 2. Identify the potential short-term efficacy of Lock and Protect on home firearm and medication storage, and parental self-efficacy to prevent adolescent suicide.
Aim 3: Clarify the acceptability, feasibility, and barriers to implementing Lock and Protect among ED providers, to inform realistic strategies to implement Lock and Protect in the ED.
A Dialectial Behavior Therapy - Based Gender - Affirming Intervention for Suicide Prevention Among Transgender amd Gender-Diverse People.
Principal Investigator: Dr. Corina Lelutiu-Weinberger, PhD
Associate Professor of Health Sciences Research, Columbia University School of Nursing
This exploratory research project develops and tests an evidence-based intervention based on Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) to improve suicide outcomes among transgender and gender-diverse (TGD) individuals. Referral options for clinicians in busy primary care practices are extremely limited. There are currently no TGD-specific suicide prevention interventions, despite these groups’ extremely high rates of suicidal ideation, attempts, and suicide.
Trauma - Sensitive obstetric care for perinatal health: A Pilot RCT
Principal Investigator: Dr. Pamela Scorza, MD, Assistant Professor of Women’s Mental Health (in Psychiatry) at the Columbia University Medical Center
Infants of women who have experienced childhood abuse have up to a five-fold increase in health and developmental problems. Women of color and low-income women are more likely to health and developmental problems. experience childhood abuse, making childhood abuse and its sequelae a factor in the intergenerational health and developmental problems. Women of color and low-income women are more likely to experience childhood abuse, making childhood abuse and its sequelae a factor in the intergenerational transmission of racial and socioeconomic inequities in health and development.
A novel avenue for improving perinatal outcomes in women with abuse histories is to train obstetric clinicians in the delivery of obstetric care attuned to the unique needs of women with histories of childhood abuse. Most obstetricians are not comfortable screening for childhood abuse and lack training for providing such tailored care.
This project addresses an important public health problem: the impact of childhood trauma on perinatal health and development. By designing and testing a trauma-informed intervention to be used in clinical obstetric practice, it has high likelihood of impacting clinical practice and public health.