Page 14 - 2024 Intuition, Imagination and Innovation in Suicidology Conference

Conference Outside the Box: Rethinking National Suicide

Prevention Strategies to Actually Prevent

Suicidology Suicides

Invited lecture · Lanny Berman

in Dr. Lanny Berman is affiliated with the Department of Psychiatry and Behavio-
ral Sciences at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Between 1995 and 2014 he
Innovation addition to various distinguished roles, he also served as President of the Ameri-
served as Executive Director of the American Association of Suicidology (AAS). In

can Association of Suicidology (AAS) from 1984 to 1985 and President of the In-
ternational Association for Suicide Prevention from 2009 to 2013. An accompli-
and shed scholar, Dr. Bermanhaspublished over175peer-reviewed articlesand book
chapters and edited or authored eight books.
Imagination on plans/strategies and action programmes. There is considerable consisten-
Abstract. Roughly 40 countries now have adopted national suicide preventi-

cy among these in proposed strategies, both those that are evidence-based
and those that are best practices. In spite of this general agreement across
countries, evidence of effectiveness remains lacking. If these results were to
Intuition, occur in the world of corporate business, heads would roll. Instead, the usual
outcome has been a revision and reissuance of a national strategy, often not
based on a either a macro or evaluative perspective. To take but one exam-
ple, the U.S. is now issuing its 3rd edition (over a 23 year period) during which
2024 its suicide rate has not declined, but, rather, has risen 34. The solution does
not lie in yet another or revised set of strategies; rather it rests on understan-
ding what drives success, be it in business or public health, and, notably in
attention to implementation science. In the world of suicide prevention, this
is out-of-the box thinking and lives are depending on just that.

14 https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-293-354-8.7