Firearm Injury Prevention at Pop-Up Safety Town

Abstract

Loaded and/or unlocked firearms account for most unintentional firearm injury deaths among young children in home settings. Provider-delivered clinic-based interventions to promote secure firearm storage have shown some promise; however, families state that they do not prefer to hear about firearm safety from healthcare providers and providers themselves cite many barriers such as time constraints and discomfort. Our preliminary data from Pop-Up Safety Town community events suggests that parents are interested in learning about firearm safety in the community context. Thus, we propose to use a community approach to co-develop and evaluate a brief secure storage intervention with parents of young children at Pop-Up Safety Town community events. The proposed study will deepen our understanding of the efficacy of brief interventions to promote secure firearm storage in community settings. Further, the study will provide valuable knowledge about secure storage intervention components desired by families with young children. If the pilot intervention is successful, we will apply for external funding to develop and evaluate an app-based version of the refined brief intervention that could be tested in other community settings that serve young children and families (e.g., Head Start/preschool registration) and ultimately, be scaled to reach a broader range of families.