June 16, 2025
Howard College hosted its fifth Annual Victors Over Violence Award Ceremony at Howard College Hospital.
On Might 30, Howard College hosted its fifth Annual Victors Over Violence Award Ceremony at Howard College Hospital, an occasion that honors survivors of traumatic violence in addition to the healthcare groups that help them, the occasion additionally features as a therapeutic area for the bigger Washington, D.C., neighborhood.
Howard College’s hospital has been designated a Degree I Trauma Middle and treats roughly 40,000 sufferers a 12 months by its emergency division, but it surely additionally holds area for trauma surgeons, nurses, psychological well being advocates, and a violence intervention and prevention unit that gives wraparound care extending from the neighborhood to the hospital’s intensive care unit.
Based on a press launch from Howard College, among the scars survivors carry don’t ever heal, as one honoree, Derrick Scott, made clear in his remarks on the ceremony. “The ache doesn’t go away—you simply be taught to dwell with it,” Scott mentioned. “I misplaced my finest buddy. Every single day I carry that ache. However I’m nonetheless right here. And I’m nonetheless preventing.”
Kenyatta Hazlewood, BSN, MPH, RN, and the operational officer of the Trauma Program who hosts the ceremony, mentioned within the press launch that Scott’s story is central to why the hospital is dedicated to honoring the entire victims of traumatic violence, together with, however not restricted to, gun violence.
“This division is about greater than saving lives—it’s about constructing them again up,” Hazlewood mentioned. “Derrick’s story reminds us why trauma work should embody each the physique and the soul.”
Based on Dr. Alexander Evans, though the healthcare group’s preliminary aim is to deal with the affected person that comes into the hospital, their subsequent aim entails the neighborhood that the affected person belongs to, together with individuals like Scott, who could also be coping with survivor’s guilt.
“The primary aim is at all times to avoid wasting a life,” Evans mentioned within the press launch. “However what comes after—the emotional, psychological, and non secular therapeutic—that’s the place the actual restoration begins. Each affected person carries their harm in a different way. Some want surgical procedures. Some want silence. All of them want help.”
Scott, in the meantime, opened up in regards to the wounds that those that dwell carry within them, the injuries that medication and surgical procedures can’t probably hope to heal.
“Not everyone walks away from it,” Scott mentioned. “I misplaced my buddy that evening. I give it some thought day by day. A few of us are nonetheless in it. A few of us are attempting to run from it. However one of the best ways by is to face it, to speak about it, and to search out individuals who gained’t allow you to quit.”
Along with Scott, the hospital additionally honored 22-year-old Rayne Bradshaw, who was paralyzed as the results of a mass capturing. Bradshaw was not capable of attend the ceremony, however the employees, like Hazlewood, praised her braveness and her progress as she undergoes remedy to recuperate bodily.
Based on Dr. Roger A. Mitchell, the president of Howard College Hospital, Scott’s story emphasizes the necessity for traumatic violence to be seen and handled as a public well being disaster.
“After we speak about trauma, we’re not simply speaking about gunshot wounds or automotive accidents—we’re speaking in regards to the power, layered impression of violence on complete communities. Meaning displaying up for survivors not solely once they arrive in disaster, however lengthy after they’ve been discharged.”
He concluded, “Therapeutic doesn’t occur in a single surgical procedure. It’s a course of, and it requires neighborhood. Occasions like this luncheon remind us that the individuals we take care of are greater than circumstances. If you see somebody like Derrick come again stronger, it’s a reminder of the impression we are able to have when trauma care is steady, compassionate, and community-based.”
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