Assessing and Managing Suicide Risk for Mental Health Professionals

Many people who have died by suicide were either in treatment or had some recent contact with a mental health professional. Clinicians have expressed a critical need for more training to assist them with assessing, treating, and managing suicidal patients.

The Suicide Prevention Resource Center (SPRC), operated by HHD, received funding from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to design and disseminate professional training to address this need. SPRC developed a one-day workshop, based on a set of core competencies for assessing and managing suicide risk identified by leading clinician researchers.

The engaging mix of pre-workshop reading, lecture, resource manuals, paired practice, journaling, discussion, and video demonstration has proven to be highly effective. SPRC has delivered this training to mental health professionals in a wide variety of organizations—state health departments, private foundations, local mental health associations, universities and colleges, hospitals, and federal agencies such as the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Marine Corps.