The annual Healing After Suicide Conference — co-sponsored by the American Association of Suicidology and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention/Suicide Prevention Action Network (SPAN USA) — is another helpful resource for survivors.

This year’s conference — on Sat., April 24, in Orlando, Fla. — will feature keynote speaker Donna Schuurman, executive director of the Dougy Center for Grieving Children & Families in Portland, Ore. The luncheon speaker is Thomas Joiner, Bright-Burton Professor of Psychology at Florida State University and a survivor of his father’s suicide.

The Healing After Suicide Conference also features a number of concurrent workshops in the afternoon, including

• “The 5 Tasks of Grief”
• “Survivors Working in Suicide Prevention: A Dialogue”
• “After a Suicide: Helping the Children Heal”
• “Suicide Loss and the Military” (Panel)
• “Men’s Grief” (Panel)
• “Survivors in Action: Finding Your Role in Suicide Prevention and Advocacy”

The all-day conference closes with a healing ceremony, which will be led by Iris Bolton, author of the classic My Son, My Son.

Please download the registration brochure and note that registration is also available online.

Franklin Cook, Editor and Publisher
“Suicide Prevention News and Comment”
(& AFSP/SPAN Co-Chairman of this year’s Healing After Suicide Conference)

Below is a guest post from AFSP’s Survivor Initiatives Manager, Rebecca Thorp:

As those on the front lines of crisis support, we know that you often hear from individuals and families who are bereaved after a suicide loss. The following resources are offered by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and can help you to provide the best possible support to these callers.

Read the rest of this entry »

Some of you have submitted questions to Lifeline staff with respect to the recently released RFP. We encourage you to review the RFP carefully, as you may find the answers to many question within the document itself or on the RFP page of the  Members-Only site.  However, we want to be sure to capture the questions that we realize the RFP does not clearly answer. We have created this running blog post to serve that purpose. If you have additional questions regarding the RFP, please feel free to post them in the comments section below. We will check back frequently and update this blog with answers as we go.

Increasing capacity to answer Lifeline calls:

Q: My center has a high answer rate (above 90%) so how would it increase its capacity to answer Lifeline calls?

Since you center already has a high answer rate, your proposal should indicate how your center will undertake new activities while maintaining its high answer rate.

Q: Our Center has a high answer rate, in increasing our capacity, should we anticipate a higher volume of Lifeline calls to be routed to our Center? Can we increase capacity and demonstrate other improved outcomes instead of increased volume if the answer to the first question is no?

We will not route additional calls to your Center without your instruction to do so. And the RFP does not require you to change your coverage area. However, if you would like to expand your coverage area, please contact Jessica Haas at jhaas@mhaofnyc.org.  As stated in the RFP, the stipend awards should be used to “increase the center’s capacity to answer Lifeline calls.” If your Center already has high answer rate, you should describe how your center will undertake new activities (i.e., outreach or follow-up) while maintaining your high answer rate.

Provide follow-up to hotline callers at high risk for suicide:

Q: We are working on our RFP for Follow Up, and would greatly appreciate any information you could provide regarding the Letter of Intent or MOU from our local ED(s).  As I understand it, a letter will strengthen our application as for Follow Up but is not mandatory?

If you plan to submit a proposal for follow up you really should include either a Letter of Intent from your local ED or an Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between your agency and the ED. The reason these items are stressed is that without either your proposal would not appear practical or feasible to the reviewers. Developing a relationship with an ED where none existed before is a lengthy and time consuming process, and it is unlikely, given the relatively short time frame for this project, that you would be able to engage key decision makers, formalize a follow up plan, and initiate the project within the one-year time frame.

Either a Letter of Intent or an MOU is acceptable. A Letter of Intent would need to include as much information as possible on what both parties are agreeing to, though details may still need to be developed. An MOU generally includes all details of the planned program and outlines the key responsibilities of each party. Having something close to an MOU already in place at the time of the application would most definitely strengthen the proposal.

Call Log:

Q: I was hoping to find out if [the Call Log] needed to be implemented now, versus if it was okay that it is in the process of being implemented by our RFP submission.

The call log must be implemented before starting the RFP activities, not before submitting your application. The earlier the better, because you will have more predata for your outcome measures.

Budget:

Q: I notice in the sample budget you include reimbursement for a grantee meeting in Washington, DC. Is there a grantee meeting that we need to budget for?

The budget is just a sample. There will be no grantee meeting for which you need to budget.

Greetings Lifeline Network Colleagues!

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is delighted to announce the release of this Request for Proposals (RFP) to Lifeline network centers today, January 6^th, 2010.  This funding opportunity has been made possible as a result of supplemental funds provided to the Lifeline in fiscal year 2009 by SAMHSA, and will provide stipend awards to 20 Lifeline centers for one year only.  These awards are intended to enable centers to:

a) Increase their call volume capacity by enhancing staffing, equipment, or infrastructure, and

b) Conduct outreach to individuals facing severe economic stress, or

c) Provide follow-up services to those at high risk of suicide.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted on behalf of Daniel J. Reidenberg, Psy.D., Executive Director of SAVE and Lifeline Steering Committee Member

For 20 years SAVE has been the leading national organization using media as a primary source to raise awareness about suicide prevention. Dozens of campaigns including billboards, television and radio PSAs, indoor and outdoor marketing, magazine and newspaper ads have appeared in large and small markets across the country resulting in over 1 billion exposures of suicide awareness messages. SAVE would like Lifeline’s crisis centers to know about our new depression and suicide prevention public education resource materials, and invite your center to customize and/or use them in your local outreach efforts. Read the rest of this entry »

Historically, CONTACT Pittsburgh does not charge fees for our hotline/crisis intervention services and relies on a small, committed pool of volunteers.  While we have begun some revenue generating programs (primarily training and ASIST), we are very dependent on our local foundations for revenue.  We are coming to a point where we are evaluating the sustainability of our organization in it’s current model.  Over the past few years we have seen a decrease in volunteer commitment, increasing challenges in filling hotline shifts and now a decrease of funding.  In addition, in our area we have some competition from two other hotlines:  a county-funded crisis hotline that provides telephone counseling and mobile crisis service and a peer support hotline.  We want to get funding to measure the impact of CONTACT Pittsburgh within our community and determine the feasibility of maintaining our services.

I’m curious if there are other hotlines (volunteer-based or otherwise) that have executed such a study and would be willing to share the results or provide feedback on the process.

Thanks!

Christy Stuber

CONTACT Pittsburgh

cstuber@contactpgh.org

This scene may sound familiar to you:

“So John, what do you do for a living?”

“I’m the Director of a suicide prevention program”.

The inquirer’s eyes widen, he shakes his head and offers, “Wow. That sounds depressing”.

“Well, it would be depressing if my job was to witness people killing themselves. But I’m in suicide prevention; I am a part of a program that often saves people’s lives. That, to me, is pretty exciting!”

For many people, when hearing the phrase “suicide prevention”, the word “suicide” is so powerful and fearful that the “prevention” piece is not heard, nor is it understood. Some people believe that if a person really desires to kill him/herself, there’s not much we can do about it. Others may believe that suicide prevention is both possible and desirable, but have little knowledge or awareness of evidence to support their beliefs.

In either circumstance, there is a lack of “knowing”; stories and data that support the idea that suicide can be prevented are rarely given air time. The public certainly hears and sees stories in the media about suicide, so they know that happens. But they rarely, if ever, hear stories where people, who once saw no way to end their pain beyond ending their lives, later found hope and a reason to live. For those of us in crisis work, we know these stories well. We also know that these stories are the more common ones, certainly for those people that seek help through our services. For example, at highest risk of suicide are survivors of suicide attempts, who have a lifetime suicide risk of 7%. Put differently, 93% of people who had lost hope and tried to kill themselves found reasons to stay alive. A good number of these survivors of suicide attempts may shudder upon reflecting on those darkest times in their lives: “I can’t believe all that I would have missed in this life, and what it would have done to others, if I had actually killed myself”. These more common, untold stories underlie the real headlines that should feature the word “suicide”: “SUICIDE CAN BE PREVENTED”. Read the rest of this entry »