"Follow the Data": An Innovative Suicide Prevention Initiative Turns Up Unexpected Results
October 23, 2019 | Strategic Insights for Health System
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What's the news. An Oregon suicide prevention initiative has shown promising results, spurring similar efforts in other states, reports Kaiser Health News (September 23, 2019). Examining suicide trends, a county epidemiologist accompanied the medical examiner as he made his rounds investigating unnatural deaths to determine their causes and found a wealth of data representing "missed opportunities" for tracking and intervening to prevent suicides, such as the person's history of alcohol use, interpersonal violence, job loss, eviction, or foreclosure.