Official websites use. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. It is essential that investigators in clinical research settings follow ethical guidelines for monitoring, assessing, and responding to suicide risk. Given the unique considerations associated with suicide risk assessment in a research context, resources informing the development of research-specific suicide risk management procedures are needed.
With decades of collective experience across heterogeneous contexts, we discuss approaches to monitoring, assessing, and responding to suicide risk as a function of study sample e. Additional considerations include training and supervision of staff to identify suicide risk, coordination of others to respond to risk, and documentation of procedures. Finally, we attend to the impact of these procedures on the external validity of outcome data.
This manuscript provides a rationale and guidelines for monitoring, assessing, and responding to suicide risk in research.
These suggestions may vary as a function of study sample, methodology, and institution. Suicidal ideation and behavior are serious public health problems in the United States. Clearly, research focused on identifying risk factors and treatments for suicide is critical. Frequently cited reasons for the lack of empirical research on suicidal behaviors is the perceived liability, potential risks, and lack of training in monitoring and treating suicidal crises Pearson et al.
Although understandable, concerns associated with these risks may serve as barriers to conducting research on the development of suicide assessments and treatments. Others have reviewed the ethical issues associated with including individuals at risk for suicide in research e. However, as there are no standard guidelines for identifying and managing suicide risk in studies, individual researchers and their ethics committees typically make these decisions idiosyncratically based on the particular sample and research methodology.
