Brooklyn-based ER physician and founder of KAVI (Kings Against Violence Initiative) shares his passion for working to end homicide among African-American youth
Payback is a killer. The No. 1 cause of death among African-American men 15 to 34 is homicide. Dr. Rob Gore, an emergency medicine physician who grew up in the Brooklyn, NY, community where he works, saw that if he could treat his patients’ trauma, he could perhaps quell their impulse to seek retribution. Eight years ago, he founded KAVI (Kings Against Violence Initiative), which works to empower youth and transform health care in marginalized populations.
Says Dr. Gore: “Given the state of emergency we are in with regards to human life and well being, it is important that we all become activists and change agents instead of assuming the problems affecting marginalized groups are going to fix themselves.”
The TED Residency program is an incubator for breakthrough ideas. It is free and open to all via a semi-annual competitive application. Those chosen as TED Residents spend four months at TED headquarters in New York City, working on their idea. Selection criteria include the strength of their idea, their character, and their ability to bring a fresh perspective and positive contribution to the diverse TED community.
Dr. Gore is an attending physician and clinical assistant professor at Kings County Hospital – SUNY Downstate Department of Emergency Medicine in Brooklyn, NY. He is the founder and executive director of KAVI (Kings Against Violence Initiative), a hospital, school and community-based youth violence intervention prevention and empowerment program targeting teens and young adults that have been injured as a result of violence or at risk for violent and recurrent violent injury. Dr. Gore is the founder and director of the Minority Medical Student Emergency Medicine (MMSEM) Summer Fellowship, which is a mentoring and enrichment program for underrepresented minorities interested in Emergency Medicine with a focus on project development.
Since 2008 he has been working as a consultant for Clinique Espérance et Vie in Terrier Rouge (Northern Haiti) and working towards establishing a regional health care system in the northern part of Haiti. He is on the advisory board for EMEDEX International, a non-profit organization dedicated to the global promotion and advancement of emergency medicine, disaster management and public health.
Born in Buffalo, NY but raised in Brooklyn, Dr. Gore has lectured around the U.S, the Caribbean, South America and Asia and has worked in East Africa, Haiti and South America. He is a graduate of both Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA and SUNY Buffalo School of Medicine and completed his residency in Emergency Medicine at Cook County Hospital in Chicago.
ABOUT ROBERT J. GORE, MD
