Suicide Assessment and Intervention

Fulfills Requirement: Suicide

A combination of interviews (with transcripts) and articles. All content has audio versions.

Rates of suicide in the U.S. occur at an estimated rate of one every 11 minutes. The impact of suicide on family, friends, associates, as well as therapists, can be devastating. Treatment of suicidality and efforts at prevention continue to evolve, and yet, too many variables are present to accurately predict who is likely to commit suicide.

This intermediate level course is designed to assist mental health professionals in identifying the major risk factors for suicide and provide a range of tools that can be used in both the assessment and treatment of suicidal patients. The course consists of three interviews (transcripts provided), updated suicide statistics from the Centers for Disease Control, and several articles focusing on prevention and intervention of suicide. Data regarding which populations are at the highest risk for suicide and what steps individual therapists can take to assist suicidal patients is provided.

The course provides clinical decision-making tools required by therapists and explains both the standard and the latest assessment instruments for assessing suicide risk. It exposes the flaws in the too-often-used no-suicide contract, explaining why such contracts serve more to protect the therapist than the client, and in doing so may actually make some suicides more likely.

Finally, the course concludes with a skill practice exercise in which clinical scenarios are provided with questions targeting what steps therapists can take to de-escalate risks.

Additional resources and references are provided for further study but are not part of the course.