New research
- Hope in action: solution-focused conversations about suicide, 2008
- Suicide in the words of suicidologists, 2010 (E-book)
- Review and update of suicide prevention guidelines for schools
- Child and adolescent suicidal behaviour: school-based prevention, assessment, and intervention, 2011
- Suicide, self-injury, and violence in the schools: assessment, prevention, and intervention strategies, 2011
- Grief after suicide: understanding the consequences and caring for the survivors, 2011
- The origins of a New Zealand suicidal cohort: 1970-2007
- Having those conversations: the politics of risk in peer support practice
- A conceptual model of suicide in rural areas, 2011
- Is this normal? Assessing mental health in young people, 2011
- Treatment of suicidal people around the world, 2011
Hope in action: solution-focused conversations about suicide, 2008
Heather Fiske, New York: Routledge, 350 pages
Available for loan from the Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service.
Heather Fiske is a psychologist in private practice, and teaches at the University of Toronto. She is a past director of the Canadian Association of Suicide Prevention (CASP). This work comes highly recommended by Annette Beautrais: “serves as a very informative, practical, and constructive illustration of the types of problems that suicidal individuals bring to their therapists…”
The book is divided into two parts, with the first section focusing on foundations which provide an overview of the “practice principles for therapeutic talk about suicide” (p.5). The larger, second part of Fiske’s book, focuses on the applications of solution-focused therapy practices with suicidal patients of varying ages, severity, chronicity, diagnoses, and both family and community systems. Case examples add considerably to the worth of the book.
Suicide in the words of suicidologists, 2010 (E-book)
Editor Maurizio Pompili | New York: Nova Science Publishers, 299 pages
Normally a book of this size would be an expensive addition to a library, but this resource is available free online.While not a title bound to draw one to it, these 55 chapters provide a rich resource from notable suicide prevention researchers from around the world. It details the personal views and reflections of people involved in suicide research and prevention. There are contributions by the late “father of suicidology” Edwin S. Shneidman, Jane Pirkis, Graham Martin, David Lester, David Jobes, Lanny Berman, and other respected names from the field.
Review and update of suicide prevention guidelines for schools
Funded by Te Pou. Research team: Dr Sunny Collings (University of Otago), Barry Taylor.
Due for release later this year, this will review and update the existing suicide prevention guidelines for schools New evidence and services have emerged since the original guidelines were developed over 10 years ago.
Child and adolescent suicidal behaviour: school-based prevention, assessment, and intervention, 2011
New York: Guilford Press, 170 pages | David N. Miller (The Guilford Practical Intervention in the Schools series)
Foreword by Alan Berman. Available for loan from the Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service. New York: Guilford Press, 170 pages Available for loan from the Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service. Reviews and contents information
Grief after suicide: understanding the consequences and caring for the survivors, 2011
New York: Routledge, 544 pages
Edited by John R. Jordan, John L. McIntosh (series in Death, Dying and Bereavement), available for loan from the Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service. Thirty four chapters including a New Zealand perspective on suicide bereavement by Margaret Agee, and an Australian example of support programmes by Peter Bycroft, Jill Fisher, and Susan Beaton.
This book “addresses the need for an up-to-date, professionally-oriented summary of the clinical and research literature on the impact of suicide bereavement on survivors. It is geared towards mental health professionals, grief counselors, clergy, and others who work with survivors in a professional capacity.
Topics covered include the impact of suicide on survivors, interventions to provide bereavement care for survivors, examples of promising support programs for surviv
ors, and developing a research, clinical, and programmatic agenda for survivors over the next 5 years and beyond”.
Suicide, self-injury, and violence in the schools: assessment, prevention, and intervention strategies, 2011
Hoboken, New Jersey, USA : Wiley, 368 pages | Gerald A. Juhnke, Darcy Haag Granello, and Paul F. Granello
Gerald A. Juhnke, Darcy Haag Granello, and Paul
F. Granello Hoboken, New Jersey, USA : Wiley, 368 pages. Available for loan from the Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service.
Health Sociology Review, 20(2), June 2011
The origins of a New Zealand suicidal cohort: 1970-2007
By Cate Curtis and Bruce Curtis | Health Sociology Review, 20(2), June 2011
and
Having those conversations: the politics of risk in peer support practice
by Anne Scott, Carolyn Doughty, and Hamuera Kahi | Health Sociology Review, 20(2), June 2011
New Zealand had the highest rate of youth suicide among OECD countries in the mid 1990s. Cate and Bruce Curtis argue that these were a suicidal cohort, whose suicidal tendencies arose from rapid socio-economic change which started around 1970. They argue that prevention needs to take in the wider focus of socio-economic causes not just individual psycho-social factors. Anne Scott and others look at the fast growing practice of peer support and how risk management has become a central element in community-based mental health services in Aotearoa New Zealand. Health Sociology Review is published in association with The Australian Sociological Association. The June 2011 issue focus is on: Mental Health and Illness: Practice and Service Issues.
Articles available from Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service. info "at" spinz.org.nz
A conceptual model of suicide in rural areas, 2011
C. R. Stark, V. Riordan, R. O’Connor | Rural and remote health, 11, 1622
“There is no single pattern of suicide in rural areas, but there are common themes… Reviews of rural suicide make it clear that social and cultural factors are important in suicide risk as well as individual characteristics”.
The authors use the cry of pain / entrapment model for the study of rural suicide. Social isolation is a common theme to rural health, and can add to feelings of defeat, loss, the inability to escape, and no rescue.
Economic distress, mental illness, and substance abuse are seen as common risk factors. Reducing stigma, improving coping and help-seeking skills, and mitigation of particular methods of suicide are seen as effective interventions.
Is this normal? Assessing mental health in young people, 2011
Patrick D. McGorry and Sherilyn Goldstone | Australian Family Physician, 40(3), 94-97
"Mental ill-health is by far the key health issue facing young Australians today…around one in 4 young Australians experience a diagnosable mental disorder, most commonly depression, anxiety or substance abuse, or a combination of these”.
The authors argue that far from accepting this as normal adolescent “growing pains”, the distress and disability produced can last long into their adult life. Early preventive care is advocated – a lowering of the threshold (the need for a definitive diagnosis is not so important) – much the same as early assessment of skin lesions and lumps.
Seen as important considerations for primary care: developing trust; using a stepped treatment approach; frequent monitoring; avoid initiating antipsychotic medications; involve family and friends, and refer as needed.
Treatment of suicidal people around the world, 2011
Ronny Bruffaerts and others | The British Journal of Psychiatry, 199, 64-70
Editorial: Cross-cultural attitudes to help-seeking among individuals who are suicidal: new perspective for policy-makers
Alexandra Pitman and David Osborn
Articles available from Mental Health Foundation Resource and Information Service, info "at" spinz.org.nz
Most people with suicide ideation, plans and attempts receive no treatment, particularly in low-income countries. This is the stark conclusion from the WHO World Mental Health Surveys. Even in high income countries, only 56% of people who were suicidal had sought treatment of any type in the previous year. Reasons given for this low help seeking were not stigma or poor access, rather the perceived usefulness of help offered. Pitman and Osborn, in their editorial, conclude that this appears to be “an apparent rejection of mainstream services”, showing the need for much improved cultural competence.
