Public health physician Dr. Brian Klausner believes the time to address the chronically unhoused is now. Klausner, who draws from years of experience caring for the homeless population, shares stories behind the statistics in his first book "In the Gaps: Better Understanding the Expensive Human Suffering of Chronic Homelessness."
Klausner has spent his career caring for high-risk patients experiencing homelessness on the streets and in the clinics of Boston and Raleigh. Klausner co-chaired Wake County's Familiar Face Population Health Task Force and helped establish WakeMed’s Center for Community Health, Innovation, and Equity.
"In the Gaps" offers a personal insight into understanding chronic homelessness, the roots of trauma, and the solutions grounded in our shared ideals and values. The book also explores the systemic failures of the American health care system in addressing the health and well-being of the unhoused — and how political rhetoric can further divide the general public’s approach to aiding this population.
The book highlights how we can come together, around commonly shared values and principles, in order to better address the growing social crisis of homelessness in America (record highs nationally and on the rise in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area). Many of the arguments are intuitive and the book, to date, has received strong bipartisan support for its messages.
On the next Charlotte Talks, we sit down with Klausner to discuss potential solutions and ways to humanize this growing problem.
GUEST:
Dr. Brian Klausner, author of "In the Gaps: Better Understanding the Expensive Human Suffering of Chronic Homelessness," executive medical director, WakeMed Center for Community Health, Innovation, and Equity
