Johns Hopkins International Injury Research Unit receives NIH Grant on Injury Training in Vietnam

Recently, the Johns Hopkins International Injury Research Unit (JH-IIRU) was awarded a five-year grant on injury training in Vietnam from the Fogarty International Center of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The grant will build on existing work between Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (JHSPH), USA and Hanoi School of Public Health (HSPH), Vietnam – each with a great commitment to understanding the public health impact of trauma and injuries, experience and expertise in research, and a history of collaborative work. 

The D43 grant was awarded to JH-IIRU associate director, Dr. Abdulgafoor Bachani and JH-IIRU director, Dr. Adnan Hyder, who will serve as the principal investigators of this training program. Dr. Cuong Pham, director of the Center for Injury Policy and Prevention Research (CIPPR) at HSPH, will serve as the senior foreign investigator and co-investigator. 

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), over 5 million people die globally each year from trauma, injuries and violence; with a disproportionate burden in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). In Vietnam as well as the Southeast Asia region, local capacity for research on trauma and injuries is lacking. The absence of comprehensive training programs in the science of trauma and injury prevention and the lifelong social and economic impact within the larger public health sector in Vietnam is a serious impediment to analytic work in this field. In addition, the lack of objective national data on the health of individuals, the socio-economic welfare of households, and the Vietnamese society does not allow the magnitude of the burden to be appreciated. 

The grant will address both of these barriers through a collaborative program which will train human resources in Vietnam to generate the data and apply it for concerted action to reduce the growing burden of trauma and injuries. 

The overall goal of the Johns Hopkins University-Hanoi School of Public Health Trauma and Injury Research Program in Vietnam (JHU-Hanoi TRIP) is to strengthen research capacity on injury and trauma in Vietnam, as well as their long term health, economic and societal consequences through an innovative model of sustainable capacity development. The objectives of the Johns Hopkins University-Hanoi School of Public Health Trauma and Injury Research Program in Vietnam include: to implement a capacity development model to address a major gap in injury and trauma research, a leading health burden in Vietnam and establish mechanisms to ensure long term sustainability for a strong research enterprise in Vietnam; to use the expertise developed at HSPH in teaching public health to strengthen research capacity in Southeast Asia; and to further strengthen the existing injury center at HSPH to support such research.

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