Earlier this year, SPRC released its Call to Action and Summary of Priority Areas (Call to Action) based on the 2021 State and Territorial Needs Assessment (SNA). The Call to Action identified four targeted areas of infrastructure to strengthen suicide prevention efforts in the U.S. This month’s State Suicide Prevention Infrastructure Update newsletter explores the third and fourth priorities:

According to SPRC’s SNA findings, 45 percent of states and territories reported active efforts to increase community representation in suicide-related data. Even so, only 16 percent of states and territories reported that populations that are high risk and underserved were sufficiently represented in the data that inform suicide prevention programs and efforts.

This toolkit is a step-by-step guide for initiating suicide prevention activities in a community. It offers guidance and practical tools to help with goal setting, stakeholder mapping, and action planning alongside several examples of successful initiatives in the U.S. and elsewhere.

SPRC’s newest workbook was designed to help state suicide prevention coordinators determine whether to conduct a community needs assessment (CNA) in local communities, and if so, how to prepare to conduct one.

A Voice at the Table:

This short documentary highlights how the voices of individuals with lived experience can inform and help shape suicide prevention plans, policies, and trainings.

SPRC’s 2021 SNA also found that only 45 percent of states and territories reported having a sustainable state or territory-wide data system for collecting and analyzing suicide death data. Only 30 percent reported successfully linking different data systems together to inform prevention efforts (i.e., linking state mental health data with death record data).

States and territories were also asked what types of suicide prevention evaluation activities they had conducted in the past year. Only 46 percent had conducted evaluations of statewide suicide prevention goals and/or suicide prevention rates. This left 54 percent without data to demonstrate the outcomes of their investments in suicide prevention strategies.

To help your state act on Priority 4, consider these resources:

RAND Suicide Prevention Program Evaluation Toolkit: This toolkit is designed to help program staff overcome common challenges in evaluating and planning improvements to their programs.

Data Linkage Strategies to Advance Youth Suicide Prevention: A Systematic Review for a National Institutes of Health Pathways to Prevention Workshop: The review identifies and describes data systems that can be linked to data from prevention studies to advance youth suicide prevention research.

SPRC’s Making a Data Request: The resource offers guidance in making requests to external agencies or organizations and can you help you clarify your needs, capacity, and ask.

Research-Practice Partnerships: Developing Data Sharing Agreements: The William T. Grant Foundation offers examples and resources on creating data sharing agreements.

SPRC is in the process of aggregating and reviewing responses to the 2022 SNA. Our findings from this most recent iteration of the SNA will be shared in the coming weeks!