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National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

suicidepreventionlifeline.org

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Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#11

Post by rdl »

The one at MIT, Nightline, was smart because it pitched itself as a general "call for any reason at night" number -- I called a couple times to get urgent help (after someone tried unsuccessfully to mug me, and I needed to figure out who to report to) -- not just for suicidal people.

I suspect there are depressed people who may ultimately kill themselves who, if there were some number solely for "suicidal people", would never call, but would be likely to call "call for any reason", and then get access to mental health care in addition to whatever the phone operator gives them.

Nice to see that somehow the MIT administration fucked up Nightline, too, so it's closed for a year. Good job guys!

Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#12

Post by pfortuny »

Whenever your depression (or anything similar) symptoms are relieved and another person is helping you, that is enough to get you at least 'just a bit' further away from suicide. And, really, this cannot be easily accounted for.

The problem with human interactions and ease of anxiety is that you will probably never be able to get a proper and useful metric.

I'd say most depressive people would not fill a form after calling any help hotline.

Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#15

Post by jrogers65 »

The most effective immediate suicide prevention available is a surprising one. It's Ketamine. It takes effect very rapidly and the anti-depressant effects persist for months from a single dose. It's a wonder how SSRI's are in wide use when there are far more effective treatments which have been around since the 60's. Marketing and business are to blame for that, I suppose.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/251220.php

There are also some novel NMDA antagonists (same mechanism as Ketamine) in the works, which come with less perception alterations, the names of which escape me, which will change things for the better for a lot of people.

Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#16

Post by bjxrn »

fourstar wrote: post #2

Not trying to be facetious here, but are there some kind of statistics somewhere out there that show how effective suicide hotlines are? I always hear about them, but have yet to hear about someone who used one successfully. E.g. X% of people have been dissuaded by suicide attempts after speaking to a suicide hotline.

I don't have the numbers at hand, but I've heard of a study saying that suicide very often is a very impulsive action. Saying that in most cases there's less than an hour between deciding to commit suicide and the action itself (numbers might be off here).

Looks like I got it from a Freakonomics podcast [1]: "One academic study looked at attempted suicides in Houston among 15 to 34 year olds. It found that in 70 percent of the cases, the time between deciding to commit suicide and taking action was under an hour. Seventy-percent of the cases. For about one-quarter of the people involved, the time gap was five minutes or less."

Of course, from this it doesn't follow that a hotline it necessarily effective. Luckily britta already posted links to some studies.

[1] http://www.freakonomics.com/2011/06/21/the-suicide-paradox-f...

Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#17

Post by objclxt »

jrogers65 wrote: post #15

The most effective immediate suicide prevention available is a surprising one. It's Ketamine. It takes effect very rapidly and the anti-depressant effects persist for months from a single dose. It's a wonder how SSRI's are in wide use when there are far more effective treatments which have been around since the 60's. Marketing and business are to blame for that, I suppose. http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/251…

Ketamine may be effective, but is it useful for 'immediate' prevention? I suppose this depends on what you mean by 'immediate'. Someone already posted a link here suggesting a significant number of suicides are impulsive, and many people have planned suicides without their friends or family having any idea.

I can't see how in many of these situations a controlled drug is going to help. We could only administer ketamine to those who exhibit depression or suicidal tendencies, but sadly these signs are not always visible or picked up.

Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#18

Post by jrogers65 »

objclxt wrote: post #17
jrogers65 wrote: post #15

The most effective immediate suicide prevention available is a surprising one. It's Ketamine. It takes effect very rapidly and the anti-depressant effects persist for months from a single dose. It's a wonder how SSRI's are in wide use when there are far more effective treatments which have been around since the 60's. Marketing and business are to blame for that, I suppose. http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/251…

Ketamine may be effective, but is it useful for 'immediate' prevention? I suppose this depends on what you mean by 'immediate'. Someone already posted a link here suggesting a significant number of suicides are impulsive, and many people have planned suicides without their friends or family having any idea. I can't see how in many of these situations a controlled drug is going to help. We could only administer ketami…

I meant in the context of someone about to commit suicide and calling a helpline. Send someone over, give them an injection and you've bought a few months of time during which they can recieve therapy. A lot of failed suicide attempts tend to get repeated. It would solve that issue very well.

Re: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

#19

Post by [deleted] »

jrogers65 wrote: post #15

The most effective immediate suicide prevention available is a surprising one. It's Ketamine. It takes effect very rapidly and the anti-depressant effects persist for months from a single dose. It's a wonder how SSRI's are in wide use when there are far more effective treatments which have been around since the 60's. Marketing and business are to blame for that, I suppose. http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/251…

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