Georgia Violent Death Reporting System Overview – GA DPH

The GA-VDRS is a collaborative project with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS). GA-VDRS is a population-based, public health reporting system that captures information on violent deaths including homicides, suicides, unintentional firearm deaths, deaths from legal intervention, and deaths for which the intent and cause are undetermined.

GA-VDRS provides valuable context about violent deaths such as relationship problems; mental health problems and treatment; toxicology results; and life stressors, such as recent job problems, finances, or physical health problems. Extensive information about the incidents, such as weapons used, characteristics of suspects, and locations where they occurred are also included. These data are assembled by GA-VDRS abstractors from different sources including death certificates, law enforcement records, Coroners and Medical Examiners records, and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) trip reports.

GA-VDRS is located within the Division of Epidemiology, Chronic Disease, Health Behaviors, and Injury Epidemiology Section (CHIE) to provide injury and violence prevention programs, researchers, and policymakers with timely information on the victims, suspects, relationships, circumstances, and weapons that are associated with incident of violence that results in fatality.

The GA-VDRS data are available on the Georgia Department of Public Health Website and can be accessed through the GA-VDRS Data Dashboard (QR code left) which includes annual age-adjusted rates on overall violent deaths, suicides, homicides, unintentional firearm, and undetermined intent from calendar year 2016-2023 that is the most recent year released. Data are made available at the State, Public Health Districts (PHD), Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Regions, Rural/Non-Rural and County-level level by various sex, race, and age groups. Trend data and maps are also available through the dashboard. For easy use, you can select your query and the type of analysis you want and download trends, bar charts, and maps in a pdf format, PowerPoint presentation or simply an excel sheet. See examples showing Georgia homicide rate by county identifying Warren County with the highest age-adjusted homicide rate of 38.7 per 100,000 people for 2019-2023 (top right), and a summary of circumstantial information partially provided by law enforcement on Georgia’s suicides (bottom right).

GA-VDRS data are complete when all our data sources report to us, one of which is

 law enforcement. Yearly and based on violent deaths occurring within your jurisdiction, a letter will go out from GA-VDRS team with a list of violent deaths. If you received this letter please do not ignore it and please contact us if you need additional guidance. GA-VDRS lead abstractor can be reached via email at Cijji.johnson@dph.ga.gov or you may contact me at rana.bayakly@dph.ga.gov. The GA-VDRS team is looking forward to collaborating with each police agency and providing you with additional information as needed. GA-VDRS team thanks you for all your hard work and together we can make Georgia safe and healthy.