MCHP-Catalyzed Cardiff Data Manager Facilitates Comprehensive Violence Data
Violence has been identified in recent Milwaukee County Community Health Needs Assessments as one of the leading health and health care issues in our community. It is now the leading cause of injury and death for children and youth ages 15-24.
Since 2017, the Milwaukee Health Care Partnership’s (MHCP) Plan Priorities have included violence intervention and prevention as a focus area. Members work alongside public, academic, and community partners to increase violence prevention and intervention efforts in health care settings. This includes supporting positions, like the Cardiff Data Manager, to build a stronger infrastructure for collective work and demonstrate use cases for support into the future.
The Cardiff Data Manager is housed within the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) Comprehensive Injury Center’s (CIC), Division of Data Analytics and Informatics (DDAI). This position provides data and analytic support for the Cardiff Model of Violence Prevention, a place-based approach to violence prevention and community safety with a focus on bringing together disparate data sources to understand and develop strategies to address and reduce violence. MCW’s CIC and the Department of Emergency Medicine (EM) have been working with communities in Milwaukee County to translate the Cardiff Model since 2015 and the Cardiff Data Manager is now an integral part of this collaborative effort funded through a variety of sources.
The MHCP health system Shared Community Investment Fund (SCIF) directly supported the Cardiff Data Manager position for two years. “The investment by the MHCP provided significant infrastructure for the data management and analysis that directly impacted the Cardiff work during this time and also provided additional foundation to set the stage for this work to continue into the future,” said Dr. Constance Kostelac, director of the DDAI in the CIC.
“The Cardiff Model is unique because it integrates data from multiple sources, such as hospital/emergency, emergency medical services, law enforcement, and more, allowing for a more complete picture of assaultive violence not available within one data source alone,” said Dr. Jennifer Hernandez-Meier, Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine. “The Data Manager is key to ensuring this data is not only collected properly but packaged and reported in a way that informs real change across partners and sectors.”
Cardiff data is shared at the standing Cardiff meetings involving MHCP members, public partners, and community-based organizations, through the Milwaukee and West Allis Public Health Collaboratives.
“MHCP members prioritize data-driven solutions and reaching across sectors to build the most effective, collaborative solutions,” said Marlaina Jackson, Director Community Health, National Center for Clinical and Community Impact, Aurora Health Care. “Our health system sponsors are thrilled to have supported the launch of this position and to see its continued sustainability and impact.”
For example, Cardiff in the city of Milwaukee is currently focused within six neighborhoods which Cardiff data demonstrate to have high concentrations of assaultive violence. Recent interventions generated from the community data discussions include strategic placement of increased lighting through the installation of flood lights and doorbell cameras provided by the Alert Neighbor Program, increased police engagement and presence, and an enhanced understanding of the relationship between alcohol outlets and violence through a retail alcohol outlet data collection effort. A Planning Group has been established to continue to guide collaborative work in those neighborhoods as Cardiff expands to other areas across the city.
“It has been extremely rewarding to be able to translate data from disparate data sources on assaultive violence into impactful work across the county in collaboration with a diverse group of partners,” said Leilani Lopez-Blasini, Cardiff Data Manager.
Following the MHCP funding, the Cardiff Data Manager position has been sustained with additional grant funding and as part of an ongoing partnership between EM and the CIC at MCW to support the critical collaborative efforts within both West Allis and Milwaukee. The goal is to demonstrate the continued development and success of the Cardiff translation and to work toward making it an established part of the violence prevention efforts in both jurisdictions and to provide a model for how this translation can be implemented across Milwaukee County and beyond.