School Personnel Experiences in Notifying Parents About Their Child's Risk for Suicide: Lessons Learned

Abstract

BACKGROUND Schools across the nation are increasingly implementing suicide prevention programs that involve training school staff and connecting students and their families to appropriate services. However, little is known about how parents are engaged in such efforts. METHODS This qualitative study examined school staff perspectives on parent involvement in the implementation of a district-wide suicide prevention program by analyzing focus group and interview data gathered on the program implementation processes. Participants included middle school teachers, administrators, and other school personnel. RESULTS Study results revealed that in the immediate wake of a crisis or concern about suicide, school staff routinely contacted parents. However, substantial barriers prevent some students from receiving needed follow-up care (eg, lack of consistent follow-up, financial strain, parental stress, availability of appropriate services). Despite these challenges, school staff identified strategies that could better support parents before, during, and after the crisis. In particular, school-based services increased the success of mental health referrals. CONCLUSIONS Our study suggests that systematic post-crisis follow-up procedures are needed to improve the likelihood that students and families receive ongoing support. In particular, school-based services and home visits, training and outreach for parents, and formal training for school mental health staff on parent engagement may be beneficial in this context.

Latina Adolescents Health Risk Behaviors and Suicidal Ideation and Suicide Attempts: Results from the National Youth Risk Behavior Survey 2001–2013

“…Parents will need information on how and where to obtain mental healthcare for their adolescents. They will also need information on the causes of mental health problems and issues regarding the stigma by some toward mental illness [39][40][41]. • Schools need to develop school-community partnerships specifically as ready sources of referral of students who threaten or have attempted suicide.…”

Feasibility of School-Based Identification of Children and Adolescents Experiencing, or At-risk of Developing, Mental Health Difficulties: a Systematic Review

“…Four of the studies with qualitative elements (D'Souza et al 2005;Kirk 2014;Nadeem et al 2016;Whitney et al 2011) scored well on the CASP tool, indicating appropriate research design, recruitment, data collection, and data analysis. Each study also included a clear statement of aims and findings and added value to the evidence base.…”

“…Eight studies reported on the feasibility of staff in-service training, six of which focused on identification of suicide risk (Eckert et al 2003;Eckert et al 2006;Kalafat and Elias 1994;Miller et al 1999;Nadeem et al 2016;Scherff et al 2005;Whitney et al 2011) and one of which on ADHD (Sayal et al 2006). All but two studies (Nadeem et al 2016;Sayal et al 2006) examined in-principle feasibility and all examined the views of school staff.…”

“…There was no clear consensus on whether in-service training for identifying suicide risk matched school priorities. Although staff questioned whether mental health should be the responsibility of schools (Nadeem et al 2016;Whitney et al 2011), they generally viewed in-service training as beneficial for students (Eckert et al 2003;Miller et al 1999;Scherff et al 2005). Furthermore, although school staff believed that in-service training was appropriate for a variety of students (Miller et al 1999), some evidence suggested that female students may find staff in-service training more acceptable than do males (Eckert et al 2006).…”

“…Furthermore, although school staff believed that in-service training was appropriate for a variety of students (Miller et al 1999), some evidence suggested that female students may find staff in-service training more acceptable than do males (Eckert et al 2006). Finally, school staff expressed concern about teacher and parent buy-in (Nadeem et al 2016;Whitney et al 2011).…”