Enhancing Care for Youth at Elevated Suicide Risk: Impact of the Assessing and Managing Suicide Risk (AMSR) Training.

Abstract

Suicide is a leading cause of preventable death among youth worldwide. Improving the knowledge and skills of professionals who care for youth is imperative to lowering the suicide rate. The Assessing and Managing Suicide Risk (AMSR) training aims to enhance professionals' therapeutic skills and increase the use of best practices for those working with individuals at elevated suicide risk. Changes in suicide prevention-specific therapeutic skills and the utilization of recommended brief interventions were evaluated in the 3 months following participation in AMSR training. Participants were youth-serving professionals (N = 115) across varied practice settings (e.g., mental health, education, emergency services) who attended an AMSR training and completed a pre-training and a 3-month post-training evaluation. Wilcoxon signed-rank tests were used to examine changes across time. Professionals reported a significant increase in use of recommended therapeutic skills overall, specifically in validating youth's experience of suicidal thinking and conveying that suicidal ideation is taken seriously. Moreover, professionals reported a significant increase in the use of specific brief interventions, namely safety planning and referring youth to additional care. Brief interventions that did not demonstrate significant change post-training included lethal means safety counseling and collaboration with caregivers. This is one of the first studies to evaluate the impact of AMSR training, a widely disseminated suicide prevention training, on self-reported clinical practices. Findings have important implications for efforts aimed at training a competent and confident professional workforce.