The Public Health Approach to Reducing Suicide: Opportunities for Curriculum Development in Psychiatry Residency Training Programs

Abstract

The authors review the current status of suicide prevention curricula in psychiatry training programs, describe the public health approach to suicide prevention, discuss public health strategies for reducing suicides and the unique role played by psychiatrists with respect to suicide prevention, and offer public health-oriented suicide prevention curriculum guidelines for psychiatry residents.

Psychiatric Emergencies

“…Unlike their vascular emergency counterparts, however, no evidence-based algorithms exist to reliably assess, manage, and prevent suicide. 12 The low frequency of suicide is partly responsible for this difficulty. Suicides accounted for 1.6% of all deaths in the US in 2014.…”

Improving Psychiatric Education Related to Suicide

“…Several articles in this collection [4,[8][9][10][11][12][13] focus on the development of educational programs that help strengthen suicide prevention, including screening, skills, and suicide awareness/management. The abovementioned report by Downs and colleagues [4] presents a 4-year trial of the Healer Education Assessment and Referral (HEAR) program.…”

“…The electronic version was equivalent to the in-person CAMS program on aspects such as satisfaction and practice adoption. Cornette and colleagues [10] discuss suicide prevention curricula and the public health approach to suicide as two important parts of a strategy to reduce suicide rates. They emphasize that selfinflicted injury is the hallmark of a psychiatric emergency, which is equivalent to a heart attack in cardiology.…”

“…Drawing from this analogy, they argue that in comparison to the rest of medicine's development of specific intervention protocols, psychiatry could do more toward developing specific psychiatry training protocols for suicide prevention. They also noted the prominent role that psychiatrists play in managing suicidal patients in many places and psychiatrists' ability to address the burden of suicide [10]. The article by Bernert and colleagues [11] presents an important complement to the work of Cornette et al [10] by reviewing the available clinical practice guidelines in suicide prevention and their key aspects in suicide risk assessment and management.…”

“…They also noted the prominent role that psychiatrists play in managing suicidal patients in many places and psychiatrists' ability to address the burden of suicide [10]. The article by Bernert and colleagues [11] presents an important complement to the work of Cornette et al [10] by reviewing the available clinical practice guidelines in suicide prevention and their key aspects in suicide risk assessment and management. This article, especially its summary table, is an important source document for those looking to implement suitable guidelines.…”