Review of Suicide risk management: A manual for health professionals, second edition.

Abstract

Suicide Risk Management: A Manual for Health Professionals, Second Edition, by Sonia Chehil and Stan Kutcher. Maiden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012, 174 Pages (ISBN 978-0-47097856-6, US $41.50 Paperback) Reviewed by MONIQUE SEGUIN DOI: 10.1037/O0028987 This second edition follows the 2006 first edition book by Stanley Kutcher and Sonia Chehil by the same name. This paperback book of 160 pages is a practical book, targeted toward mental health practitioners: psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, general practitioners, nurses, and other allied health professionals. The aims of this book are (1) provide information regarding epidemiology and risk factors associated with suicide, (2) provide information aid in the understanding and assessment of suicide risk, (3) provide a program pertaining suicide evaluation, and (4) introduce an assessment tool and explains how identify and manage suicidal individuals. It is a short, clearly written book, which presents a number of figures, tables, bullet lists, and essays aimed at providing practical guidance and tools for the management of the suicidal or potentially suicidal patient. The book begins with a review of the epidemiology and some of the barriers detecting and preventing suicide, including a list of common myths associated with suicide, which contribute the social stigma of suicide (Chapter 1). Next is a description of the major protective factors for preventing suicide, and risk factors that are associated with suicide vulnerability (Chapter 2). Another major objective of this book is present two assessment tools developed by the authors. The Suicide Risk Assessment Guide (SRAG) acts as a self-study program assess clinical evaluation skills (Chapter 3). In the next chapter (Chapter 4), the authors introduce the Tool for Assessment of Suicide Risk (TASR), which is a checklist of risk variables for the assessment of suicide risks. Both tools were created for use in the authors' own practice and are taught health professionals. Case vignettes allow the reader practice using the information they have learnt from the book. There is a chapter (Chapter 5) that introduces special groups of suicidal patients: the chronically suicidal and the frequent lowlethality self-harming patient, the adolescent patient, and the elderly patient. This chapter is very short and touches only on the most important issues for each of these subgroups. The book concludes with short discussions on suicide prevention (Chapter 6), suicide intervention (Chapter 7), postsuicide intervention (Chapter 8), and bereavement counselling (Chapter 9). This book covers the whole range of suicide behaviours and tries provide tools and safety plan mental health practitioners. The book concludes with eight clinical vignettes (Chapter 10) established provide the reader with the possibility practice their skills by rating their evaluation using the author's Tool for Assessment of Suicide Risk (Appendix A). The author offers no correction guide for this practicum. Although this book has a number of important qualities, for example it is easy find and retrieve information, there is a major flaw: It contains no references anywhere. All throughout the book, the authors talk about research and studies that they do not identify. They base their arguments on research that may be their own or that may be published by others, but this is not specified. It is impossible know whether the information put forward is based on recent research or on much older data. For example, in the section discussing the most important prevention strategies, the authors write to date, most promising evidence-based interventions include health-provider education, means restriction and gatekeeper training (p. 110). Although this information may be based on past data, more recent data suggest that the detection and treatment of depressive disorders, follow-up on suicide attempts, and restriction of means are the strategies that have been identified as having the greatest impact on suicide prevention (Mann et al. …