"Adolescent Suicide: Screening, Risk Assessment and Intervention"
Cheryl King, PhD's research program, the Youth and Young Adult Depression and Suicide Prevention Research Program, focuses on the development and improvement of evidence-based screening tools, risk assessment strategies, and psychosocial interventions for suicidal adolescents and young adults. I am currently leading a large-scale NIMH-funded study that will develop and validate a personalized and adaptive youth suicide risk screening tool for use in medical emergency departments. This collaborative study involves 13 emergency departments from the Pediatric Emergency Medicine Applied Research Network (PECARN) in addition to an Indian Health Service Hospital. I am also leading two intervention studies. One is an NIMH-funded study, involving four universities, examining the efficacy of Electronic Bridge to Mental Health for College Students (eBridge), an online personalized suicide risk screening tool with optional online counseling ( based on motivational interviewing principles). The other is a CDC-funded study examining a mentorship intervention for youth, ages 12 to 15, who are at risk for suicidal behavior due to experiences with bullying perpetration and victimization.
This presentation will review the prevalence rates for adolescent suicide across demographic groups, the primary risk factors for adolescent suicide, and evidence-based suicide risk screening and intervention strategies. The evidence-based Computerized Adaptive Screen for Suicidal Youth (CASSY) and the Youth-Nominated Support Team intervention (YST) will be given special emphasis.
Objectives
The activity is designed to help the learner
- Describe five suicide risk factors among adolescents.
- Identify two adolescent suicide risk screening strategies.
- Name two evidence-based interventions for adolescents at risk for suicide.
This talk is sponsored by the Barbara Gay Lecture Fund, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. This educational activity received no commercial support.