Click above for information about the new national guidelines, by the Survivors of Suicide Loss Task Force.

Support After a Suicide Envisioned as a National Priority

The overarching goal of Responding to Grief, Trauma, and Distress After a Suicide: U.S. National Guidelines, by the Survivors of Suicide Loss Task Force of the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention, is ...
... to provide, for the first time, a foundation to help move the nation toward decisively addressing the needs of the bereaved and others exposed to suicide. The members of the Survivors of Suicide Loss Task Force see these guidelines as a summons to everyone with a stake in suicide postvention -- individuals, organizations, communities, states and tribes, and the U.S. society as a whole -- to ensure that every person suffering profound grief or struggling with distress after a suicide receives the compassionate outreach and healing support and services they need to live healthy and fruitful lives.
This groundbreaking document delivers information, ideas, and recommendations to set the stage for purposeful action toward accomplishing that goal. The key elements of the guidelines' strategic foundation for change at all levels of society are outlined below, along with links for each topic to a post from the Grief After Suicide blog and to a special report from Franklin Cook of Unified Community Solutions (note the links to informational graphics that accompany the topics).Please also see the blog post that summarizes all of the topics, "Groundbreaking Guidelines Address Grief, Trauma, Distress of Suicide Loss" (bit.ly/guidelinesaddress).
ELEMENT / TOPIC
Summarizes research evidence (XXX) showing that exposure to suicide unquestionably increases the chances that those exposed--perhaps especially the bereaved--are at higher risk for suicide as well as for numerous, sometimes debilitating mental health conditions
Describes a new framework (GRAPHIC) for classifying people who experience a suicide that will help focus research and practice to meet the needs of specific populations -- and highlights the effects of a fatality on family members, friends, first responders, clinicians, colleagues, and everyone who needs support (GRAPHIC) in the wake of a suicide
Advocates for a systems approach (GRAPHIC), through organizing interventions into three separate, overlapping categories:
  • Immediate Response: Based on mental-health crisis and disaster response principles
  • Support: From the familial, peer, faith-based, and community resources that help the bereaved cope with a death
  • Treatment: By licensed clinicians for conditions such as PTSD, Depression, and Complicated Grief
Argues that suicide grief is unique (XXX) because death by suicide is unique (i.e., it involves questions about the deceased's volition, the effects of trauma, the degree that suicide is preventable, and the role of stigma in people's treatment of the deceased and the bereaved)
Presents an outline of the research needed (GRAPHIC) to expand and enrich what is known about suicide bereavement and other effects of suicide (which will lead to the development of evidence-based practices in suicide postvention)
Asserts that suicide grief support efforts ought to be informed by advances in research and practice (XXX) over the past 20 years in the fields of bereavement support, traumatology, and crisis and disaster preparedness
Includes an appendix outlining numerous, practical resources for the suicide bereaved and those who care for them. This website, the After a Suicide Resource Directory, is the online version of the appendix--and will be continually expanded and updated.
REPORT
POST