Suicide Prevention Programs, Do They Work?

Posted on 27/09/2010 | 2 Comments

A few weeks ago, the Ottawa Citizen Newspaper carried another sad story about youth suicide: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/young+life+senseless/3317331/story.html. This is a story that is still unfortunately all too common. It is a story that we would all like to never see again. We all would like to be able to prevent youth suicide.
 
Unfortunately we are not very good at that yet. Hopefully we are getting better at it. A recent guest editorial by Dr. Alan Apter in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry ( Suicidal Behavior in Adolescence: 55: 271-273; 2010) pointed out that despite the plethora of so called suicide prevention programs we really have very little good evidence that any of them work. Or even that they may do no harm.
 
And these programs are very popular. Not only are they offered to individuals and organizations that think they are learning how to prevent suicide, but I understand that some health organizations and governments have mandated their application. And they are not inexpensive. I recently looked on the website of one of these so called “suicide prevention” programs and it was being offered for one hundred and sixty dollars per person! 
 
Recently our research group conducted an exhaustive and intensive assessment of the evidence that one of the most commonly used community suicide prevention programs actually prevents suicide. And, in contrast to the advertising, we where not able to find any substantive evidence that this was the case! We are in the process of writing up this research and will publish our findings in the next little while.
 
So what are we to do? Well, we should at least do what there some evidence of effectiveness for. We need to educate teachers and health care providers to better identify, refer and provide effective treatments for young people who develop a mental disorder. Will doing this prevent all youth suicides? Unfortunately not, but it would be a good start. And we need to do some good solid scientifically sound research to see if programs that say they prevent suicide actually do prevent suicide, before we spend a ton of public money on them.
 
--Stan

What people are saying?

Al Rodee said...

I teach and practice Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). While there is little scientific evidence that EFT can benefit those who contemplate suicide there is substantial anecdotal evidence that anyone can learn to help themselves re-frame the way they look at their lives. This energy psychology method has been used to treat a number of emotional and physical ailments by dealing with the core emotional issue rather than focus on the symptoms. I strongly urge you and those who care about preventing suicide to look closely at EFT

Comment made on September 28th, 2010

TTom said...

Teenage suicide is a concerning occurrence that receives much media attention in modern-day society.  Through the lens of adolescence identity-seeking and formation, we can try to understand the complexities of emotions and actions: fear, confusion, anxiety, discovery, exploration, and risk-taking.  As adolescents structure their own identity, independence, and individuality, they may struggle through a whirlwind of feelings.

As they are traveling this pathway of unknown territory, adolescents are surrounded by peers.  A young individual may want to reflect off of a fellow classmate in order to find security, acceptance, or friendship.  Isolation can be a rather daunting situation.  In the face of loneliness, adolescents may carry an extreme focus on the present, withdrawing themselves from a vision or foresight for a better, different, or improved future. 

In the New Yorker article (2008) “The friend game: Behind the online hoax that led to a girl’s suicide,” Lauren Collins describes the death of thirteen-year-old Megan Meier.  Megan’s online social life was perhaps a strong force in forming her sense of status and acceptance in school.  Social networking can provide a different identity for an adolescent; a medium where they may express their interests, opinions, and views.  Megan could explore and experiment with her sense of self.

However, technology can also expose a child, become erratically public, and involve a loss of control.  The power through which it can relay social aggression and bullying can become rather disheartening and disempowering to the adolescent and their parents.  Lauren Collins describes Megan Meier’s photograph on MySpace: “…it seemed to embody both the sadness and exhilaration of female adolescence.”  One’s growing, changing, and evolving identity is visible and unprotected to the outside world, open to criticism, neglect, and aggression.  Thus, the issue of suicide prevention and youth protection can be further complicated and difficult.

Comment made on May 09th, 2011

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Recent Comment

This is a great set of comments and rings very true. 

I totally agree that scientists (just like everyone else) have their biases and foibles.  After all, scientists are human beings too!  But science is different than scientists. 

The scientific method is the most objective frame that we have by which to evaluate and predict.  Science is not about finding truth.  It is only about being less wrong most of the time.  The scientific method (experimental design and mathematics) gives us the ability to test what we believe.  The scientific method is not used to prove something is correct, on the contrary, the scientific method is designed to prove that something is not correct!  It is designed to test what is called the “null hypothesis”.  It takes ideas that come out of left field (or wherever else they come from) and puts those ideas to an independent test.

t does not drive our beliefs.  It does however challenge our beliefs.  In that way it is self-correcting. Of course scientific inquiry and understanding lives within a wider social context.  That is one of the great features of science. 

But gravity is gravity, social context notwithstanding.  And thus it is nasty, brutish and long.  As Brecht said, (something like this) - the purpose of science is to save us from everlasting error.

By Christina Carew on May 11th

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