July 2021 Call to Action

The monthly newsletter of the Tennessee Suicide Prevention Network

Hi friends-- I hope you all have had a fun summer so far, staying cool and enjoying time with friends and family. In central office we are already looking toward the fall, in full swing planning our statewide September event in Murfreesboro! Our regional directors are also hard at work planning their regional Suicide Prevention Awareness Month events, so be on the lookout in the coming weeks for more announcements with dates for September events throughout the state. Check out the details below on how to register to attend or sponsor our event. Thanks, as always, for supporting TSPN!

-Misty

TSPN's Northwest & Southwest Regional Directors Emily Oswald and Lindsey Carr recently attended the Tennessee Teen Institute at The University of Tennessee at Martin.

Lindsey gave a suicide prevention 101 presentation and Emily gave a modified C-SSRS training to 50 adults and student advisors. Kevin Hines, a longtime friend of TSPN, addressed 300+ middle school, high school, and college aged students to tell his personal story of surviving an attempted suicide.

In June, the Upper Cumberland Region, in collaboration with the Upper Cumberland Commission on Children and Youth, and Volunteer Behavioral Health, hosted the second annual “Safeguarding Our Children & Youth” conference.

This was a virtual webinar-style conference, with presentations by: Bill Gibson, Power of Putnam Coalition Director; Dr. Christina Mick and Angela Rector, Tennessee Technological University Counseling Center; Dr. John Averitt, Cookeville Regional Medical Center and Cookeville Police Department; and Tonia Wheeler, Putnam County School System. Topics included substance abuse trends in the Region, post-COVID trauma recovery, the Columbia-Suicide Severity Rating Scale, and addressing mental health needs in individuals with autism spectrum disorders, respectively.

TSPN partnered with the Henry County Prevention Coalition, ROPS, Celebrate Recovery, and Henry County Medical Center for “Make a Splash for Prevention,” hosted at the Henry County Splash Pad in late June. The community was able to spend time with family and friends for a night of fellowship and play. Resources and materials were shared, and it was a great evening of spreading mental health health awareness.

We are hiring!

We are currently looking to hire the Mid-Cumberland Regional Director position for TSPN. If you or someone you know may be interested, you can find more details on the MC Regional Director position here.

Dr. Paul Quinnett and the team at QPR Institute are interested in beta testing a new training called QPR+. The aim of this new training is to bridge the gap between basic QPR and service providers who are untrained in suicide prevention, so that those who are QPR+ trained can start the life-saving process themselves.

This training will have a special focus on rural areas and/or people in peer support positions. If you or your organization are a good fit for this project, take a look at the abstract explaining the project in more detail. Email mleitsch@tspn.org for more details.

Did you know there is new mental health parity law in effect in Tennessee?

Mental health parity is the equal provision of benefits for mental health and substance use disorder treatments and medical and surgical treatments in insurance plans.

Take a look at this slideshow to learn more about how you can benefit from this legislation.

Don't forget-- registration is OPEN for our Statewide Suicide Prevention Awareness Month event on September 8 and 9! In this month's newsletter we're highlighting our September 8 entertainer, the "Mental Health Magician" John Midgley. Click the photo to watch a video of John performing for doctors at Vanderbilt!

CLICK HERE to register for one or both days of the event

CLICK HERE to sign up to be a sponsor of the event