Welcome to the Center for Injury Research and Prevention: Discovering a Safer World

As long as there are childhood injuries, there will be a need to apply the tools of science to prevent them. The Center for Injury Research and Prevention is a comprehensive pediatric trauma research facility at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia dedicated to addressing injury, the leading cause of death for children and adolescents.

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CPS Issue Report
After The Injury
Read About the Latest Developments in Child Crash Test Dummy Research: Download the January 2010 CPS Issue Report. This award-winning site, a decade in the making, gives parents the tools they need to help their children fully recover after an injury.

Research Programs & Networks

  • Young Driver Research Initiative (YDRI)

    Through this unique multidisciplinary academic-industry research alliance, The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and State Farm Insurance Companies® are working to advance science to reduce teen driver-related crashes. This science fuels the YDRI effort to develop and disseminate evidence-based interventions, education, and policy to promote safe driving-related behaviors among teens and their parents.

  • Center for Child Injury Prevention Studies (CChIPS)

    This center-within-a-center is an Industry/University Cooperative Research Center established in 2005 by a grant from the National Science Foundation. Faculty and students work side-by-side to conduct translational research that is practical to industry.

  • National Child Occupant Special Study (NCOSS)

    Currently in pilot phases of research, NCOSS would use NHTSA’s National Automotive Sampling System (NASS) infrastructure to identify children in crashes and apply rigorous child-focused data collection methodology to obtain in depth crash information on children.

  • Child and Adolescent Reaction to Injury and Trauma (CARIT)

    This program conducts pioneering research into the range of responses that children and their parents experience after pediatric injury so that effective interventions may be developed to reduce post-traumatic stress.

  • The Philadelphia Collaborative Violence Prevention Center (PCVPC)

    The Philadelphia Collaborative Violence Prevention Center (PCVPC) was established in 2006 through a cooperative agreement with The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with the goal of preventing violence and aggression in the lives of young people in West and Southwest Philadelphia. Through a truly collaborative relationship, PCVPC brings together academic institutions (The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, the University of Pennsylvania, Temple University and Drexel University) and community-based organizations to share equally in the planning, leadership, analysis, and dissemination of research results.

  • Crash Injury Research and Engineering Network (CIREN)

    As part of a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration-sponsored network, the Center's crash investigation team contributes multidisciplinary analyses of Children's Hospital and PCPS-based crashes to a rich database, forming the basis for potentially life-changing tools and technologies.

  • National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Indefinite Quantities Contract

    NHTSA currently provides funding for the Center to conduct research on a wide range of research topics including, abdominal protection, test dummy development, and improving restraint use in at-risk populations.

  • Partners for Child Passenger Safety (PCPS)

    In a unique collaboration between academic institutions and private industry, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, The University of Pennsylvania, and State Farm Insurance Companies® joined forced in 1997 to form Partners for Child Passenger Safety (PCPS). PCPS soon became the world’s largest child-focused motor vehicle crash surveillance system, and its findings are recognized worldwide.

  • Injury Free Coalition for Kids of Philadelphia (IFCK)

    The Injury Free Coalition for Kids of Philadelphia works in the West Philadelphia community to prevent unintentional childhood injury. The coalition's grassroots-based approach focuses on topics such as: home safety, bicycle safety, pedestrian safety alternatives, and violence reduction.

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