Rethinking Suicide Prevention

Dr. Caine is a professor and a psychiatrist at the University of Rochester Medical Center. He and colleagues started the University of Rochester Center for the Study and Prevention of Suicide, which has carried out research to understand the risk factors that lead to suicide, and has worked collaboratively with investigators in the U.S. and internationally to develop new public health and therapeutic approaches for suicide prevention.

Talk:  Rethinking Suicide Prevention

Abstract: Suicide prevention in the US during the past half-century has focused on identifying ‘high risk’ individuals. Nonetheless, suicide rates have risen 35% since 2000.  Many current research methods seek to concentrate risk pools by scouring diverse data sources (e.g., medical records; social media), to “identify THE NEEDLE in the stack of needles.” While these approaches benefit from the amplified ability to analyze big data, they alone are likely to fail to turn the rising tide of deaths due to ecological fallacy and resource limitations.

This talk will offer a broad view of suicide in the US, and provide thoughts about potential avenues for preventing premature deaths from suicide and related self-injury mortality (drug overdose deaths).  These efforts will need to incorporate two very different approaches: broadly applied, comprehensive public health initiatives to influence communities and life trajectories, and intensive, sustained interventions for those who have come to care — after surviving a suicide attempt or during the ‘peri-suicidal’ period. As part of the discussion, we will consider effective international prevention initiatives, and explore potential opportunities to link applied computer sciences to suicide prevention and clinical interventions.