• Brett Mitchell, Jungwon Min, Leah Brogan, Amy Carroll-Scott, and Joel A Fein.
• Department of Community Health and Prevention, Dornsife School of Public Health, Drexel University, 3215 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States; Department of Biostatistics and Health Informatics, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia - Roberts Center for Pediatric Research, 15th Floor, 2716 South Street, Philadelphia, PA 19146, United States. Electronic address: bm988@drexel.edu.
• Prev Med. 2024 Aug 1; 185: 108052108052.

ObjectivePrior evidence demonstrates that both firearm access and fighting can predict future violence and injury in adolescents. We aimed to examine associations between firearm access with fighting behavior and conflict perception in a sample of adolescents in an urban emergency department (ED) setting.MethodsIn 2023, we conducted a secondary analysis of 13,610 adolescent encounters in the ED of a U.S. children's hospital from 2013 to 2020, using a universally applied, self-administered computerized behavioral health survey. We compared patient characteristics by reported firearm access and fighting behavior using chi-squared tests. Generalized estimating equations (GEE) were used to investigate associations between 1) fighting behavior and firearm access, and 2) between fighting behavior and respondent preference to and reporting of fighting incident to law enforcement after adjusting for race and ethnicity, age, and gender.ResultsApproximately one-quarter of the sample reported past year fighting. Youth who reported fighting were more likely to report firearm access (AOR = 1.66, 95%CI = [1.49-1.86]). This association strengthened among youth who perceived continued conflict after a fight (AOR = 2.05, 95%CI = [1.73-2.43]). Youth who perceived continued conflict following a fight were more likely to report (AOR = 1.97, 95%CI = [1.65-2.36]) or want to report (AOR = 2.63, 95%CI = [1.81-3.81]) the fight to law enforcement.ConclusionsThose perceiving continued conflict after a fight were more likely to report access to firearms and endorse retaliation; however, they were more likely to want to report the fight to law enforcement. These findings highlight the potential for more comprehensive ED risk assessment to reduce retaliation and reinjury for adolescents reporting fighting behavior.Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

21 keywords...

hide…