Emmy Betz, MD MPH
Professor of Emergency Medicine
Director, Firearm Injury Prevention Initiative
University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Dr. Emmy Betz, MD, MPH, is an emergency physician and researcher who is nationally recognized for her collaborative approach to firearm injury prevention. She is currently a Professor of Emergency Medicine (University of Colorado School of Medicine), Deputy Director of the Injury and Violence Prevention Center (Colorado School of Public Health), and a Research Physician at the Geriatric Research, Education and Clinical Core (Eastern Colorado VA). She founded and leads the CU Anschutz Firearm Injury Prevention Initiative. She received her MD and MPH from Johns Hopkins University and completed her clinical training at the Harvard Affiliated Emergency Medicine Residency at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Dr. Betz’s area of research expertise is “patient-centered injury prevention,” or the development and testing of acceptable, effective interventions for clinical settings. Her current areas of work include “lethal means safety” (i.e., reducing access to guns and other lethal methods for those who are suicidal), older driver retirement, and firearm safety in dementia. She is a recognized national expert in firearm injury prevention and has been invited to work with numerous organizations, including: the White House PREVENTs initiative; the Department of Defense Suicide Prevention Office; the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine; the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention; and multiple national medical organizations. She co-founded and leads the Colorado Firearm Safety Coalition, a collaborative effort between public health and medical professionals and firearm retailers to reduce firearm suicides. She serves as PI and Co-I on multiple research projects funded through the National Institutes of Health, Department of Defense, and private foundations, and she has published over 145 peer-reviewed manuscripts. She is passionate about using public speaking, publications outside of scientific journals, and media engagement to help educate the public and policy-makers about injury prevention, and in 2015 she gave a TEDxMileHigh talk on firearm suicide.