SPRINGFIELD - When he was a child, Kevin Moriarty had a friend who accidentally shot and killed his own brother.

Moriarty, now Baystate Medical Center's chief pediatric surgeon, said he unfortunately still sees examples of such preventable deaths in the line of work. "The types of injuries we see in pediatrics [related to firearms] are accidental shootings--a friend shooting a friend, or a sibling shooting a sibling," he said. "The other is suicide."

The desire to prevent these kind of deaths is one of the reasons Moriarty supports the Gun Buy Back program, an annual event that brings together medical, political and law enforcement officials in Hampden County to work on reducing the harm done by unwanted household firearms.

The program is put on by the Hampden District Attorney's Office and Baystate Medical Center and gives county residents an opportunity to trade in the firearms they may want to get rid of. The effort is made in coordination with the John C. Wood II Memorial Foundation.

Between 50 to 60 guns were turned in at the Raymond Sullivan Safety Complex on Carew Street between 9 and 11 a.m. Saturday. Those who turned in guns received Big Y gift cards in return.

"The importance of this event is injury prevention and suicide prevention," said Moriarty. "I think in Massachusetts we have very good gun laws, some of the strictest in the country," he said. However, he said, safety can always be improved.

Unwanted firearms present both public health and safety concerns, agreed District Attorney Anthony Gulluni. "From a public safety perspective, we don't want guns falling into the wrong hands," he said, of lost or stolen guns that could make their way into the hands of criminals.

From a public health standpoint, Gulluni said that, statistically, a gun in the home more often leads to fatal results if a family member is suicidal. These numbers can hopefully be reduced by "getting unwanted guns out of folks homes," he said.

Also present at Saturday's event were Noreen McGirr and Cerri Bergendahl. Both women work with Baystate's Family Advocacy Center, a specialty clinic which provides counseling and other forms of assistance to youth who have been affected by abuse or a traumatic incident.

The center recently received new grant funding for a suicide bereavement program which is offering free services and assistance to young adults who may be struggling after a loss in the family due to suicide.

As two people who work daily with children affected by such preventable deaths, both McGirr and Bergendahl agreed it was crucial to improving safety to remove unwanted firearms from a residence.

"Even though firearms are not the most common form of suicide attempts, they're the most lethal," said Bergendahl. "There's more deaths by firearms than all other methods combined."

McGirr and Bergendahl said that suicide can be an impulsive decision. If firearms are available in moments of crisis they will often be used, which is why it's all the more important to have programs like the Gun Buy Back which take these lethal means out of homes.

"Suicide rates are soaring," said McGirr, referring to the national uptick in deaths across the country linked to despair. "People often can be impulsive," she said. "If you have access to something lethal, it will be used."

McGirr and Bergendahl agreed that efforts such as the Gun Buy Back were a step in the right direction in terms of preventing the trauma that their clinic aims to treat.