Medics against Violence (MAV) is a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

Charity that is involved with education and training in schools and to a range of professionals. It was founded in 2008.

History

The organisation was founded in November 2008 by three Scottish

Surgeon In modern medicine, a surgeon is a medical professional who performs surgery. Although there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon usually is also a licensed physician or received the same medical training as ...

s: Christine Goodall, Mark Devlin and David Koppel along with

Karyn McCluskey Karyn McCluskey is a Scottish forensic psychologist who is the chief executive of Community Justice Scotland. She was formerly the director of the Violence Reduction Unit. Early life She was born in Falkirk and grew up in the village of Redding ...

from the Scottish

Violence Reduction Unit The Scottish Violence Reduction Unit is a Police Scotland initiative established in January 2005 (by Strathclyde Police) which uses a public health approach to target all forms of violent behaviour including street/gang violence, domestic abuse, ...

(VRU). Their stated aims are the prevention of serious injury and death, particularly among the young people of Scotland, and to change attitudes to

violence Violence is the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy. Other definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or Power (social and p ...

in Scotland through education and awareness raising. They had start up funding of £80,000 from the Scottish Government. MAV is a participant in the

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution states its main objective as "the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of h ...

's Violence Prevention Alliance. They became a charity registered with the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator in December 2009 (SC041153).

School visits

By June 2009, the first phase of MAV's schools project had trained 55 volunteers. Visits to 13- to 14-year-old pupils in schools were planned to commence at the start of the coming school year. Sessions would involve medics speaking to pupils about the consequences of violence using a set lesson plan and film, illustrating this with experiences from a wide range of medical specialties. MAV concentrated on schools in areas of urban deprivation or those with high levels of youth violence. There was a particular focus on issues around

knife crime Knife legislation is defined as the legislation, body of statutory law or case law promulgated or enacted by a government or other governing jurisdiction that prohibits, criminalizes, or restricts the otherwise legal manufacture, importation, sale, ...

and gang membership. As of 2011 MAV had spoken to over 5000 young people in schools in the west of

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

Other professionals

A joint initiative launched in 2010 with the VRU saw MAV train dentists to spot victims of

domestic violence Domestic violence (also known as domestic abuse or family violence) is violence or other abuse that occurs in a domestic setting, such as in a marriage or cohabitation. ''Domestic violence'' is often used as a synonym for ''intimate partner ...

and signpost them towards help. MAV also take part in the VRU project the Community Initiative to Reduce Violence (CIRV) and in the Scottish Government's project No Knives Better Lives. They planned to pilot workshops for hairdressers at

Ayrshire College Ayrshire College (Scottish Gaelic: ''Colaiste Siorrachd Àir'') is a further education institution in Scotland. Formed in August 2013 from a merger between Ayr College, Kilmarnock College and the Largs and Kilwinning campuses of James Watt Co ...

in 2015. By September 2015, around 2,000 people had received training, including some hairdressers and members of the fire and rescue service as well as dentists, doctors and vets. At that point the Scottish Government announced £115,000 had been awarded to extend the ''Ask, Validate, Document and Refer'' (AVDR) programme to make it available to more professionals across Scotland.

Awards

They won a Scottish Policing Award in 2009 for their outstanding contribution to Criminal Justice and Tackling Crime and in 2011 won the Public Service Award for Glasgow East in the Community Champion Awards.Joy for local heroes - Evening Times , News , Editor's Picks
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References

{{Reflist Charities based in Scotland 2008 establishments in Scotland Violence in Scotland