ABC6: Healthcare Workers Managing Increase in Gun Violence

In central Ohio, gun violence is on the rise and the trauma team at OhioHealth Grant Medical Center is treating a significantly higher amount of gunshot victims.  

"We've seen a change like we've never seen before," said Dr. Urmil Pandya, medical director of trauma at Grant Medical Center, in an interivew with ABC6. "Downtown here at Grant we've seen more gunshot wounds and violence patients coming in than ever in our history. About one in four of the patients that we see who are getting shot are 20 or younger - so essentially teenagers."

Dr. Pandya has worked as a trauma surgeon for over a decade and told ABC6 reporter Jessi Starkey that he's never seen a year like this one.  He said in the last 12 months, Grant has seen a 50 percent increase in the number of gunshot wounds over the year prior. 

"Everybody has been through a very tough time with the pandemic. There has been a lot of psychological exhaustion, emotional exhaustion, especially in the frontline world of the healthcare workers," Dr. Pandya told ABC6. "We really focus on resilience. We make sure there are debriefings after really terrible incidents," Dr. Pandya said.

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