Suicide Prevention: Suicide Assessment and Intervention Training for Mental Health Professionals

Workshop Description:

This full-day training is designed to increase knowledge and improve the skills and confidence of clinicians and others who find themselves identifying high-risk youth and adults, and planning for their care. Participants will learn about the scope of the problem, review current information on suicide risk factors, and examine personal reactions to dealing with suicidal behaviors. Best practices in risk assessment will be presented and attendees will learn techniques for eliciting suicidal ideation. Issues relative to liability management and planning for intervention will be presented. Research on the effectiveness of this training demonstrates significant gains in knowledge and confidence. The training, which was approved in 2015 by the SPRC Best Practices Registry for Suicide Prevention, is based on current best practices and reflects the training objectives in the 2012 National Strategy for Suicide Prevention.

Participants will be able to:

• Manage personal reactions to suicidal clients

• List suicide warning signs and risk and protective factors

• Demonstrate techniques to elicit suicidal ideation and history of behaviors

• Identify strategies and tools to assess risk

• Describe how a client’s ambivalence about suicide is an opportunity to intervene and how the client may view suicide as a coping strategy

• Explain the value of appropriate postvention and grief support services for individuals and communities affected by suicide



Presented by: Riverside Trauma Center Staff: Riverside Trauma Center’s highly-trained, licensed mental health professionals have extensive  clinical experience with trauma, suicide survivors and suicide prevention.