Creating a disruptive model for suicide care

*Please note, the recording does not include the content covered in the workshop breakout rooms.

Organisation Involved: Black Dog Institute
Workshop Facilitators: Philippa Butt & Kath McLachlan
Workshop Duration: 1.5 hours

We know that 50- 60 per cent of people who die by suicide were not receiving help from a mental health professional for their suicidal thoughts prior to their death. As such, they are ‘under the radar’. This means that Australia’s existing clinical services, programs and interventions are not accessible to, or meeting, all people’s needs.

We believe this needs to change. We need a disruptive new model of care.

Under the Radar is an innovative research project looking to better understand and co-design a new model of care for people who have had thoughts or attempts to end their life and are not connected to clinical services.

This workshop provided the opportunity for the participants to contribute their ideas to a new model of suicide care that looks and feels very different to existing clinical services, with “a disruptive model of care”. This workshop did not ask people to share their personal experiences but to engage in a creative process to bring about ‘blue sky thinking’ in regard to suicide prevention.

Workshop outcomes:

– A shared view of the current assumptions and norms of clinical suicide prevention services
– Ideas of how we could “flip” these assumptions
– Opportunity statements for alternative models of care

About the Facilitators

Philippa Butt: Philippa is the Suicide Prevention Program Manager at the Black Dog Institute, managing the National Suicide Prevention Trial and a large National Health and Medical Research Council research project, Under the Radar, which is looking to better understand and design an intervention for those with thoughts of ending their life who are not connected to clinical supports. She is an experienced manager in mental health having previously worked as a Service Manager in Penrith leading a service for those with complex and severe mental health needs. Philippa is passionate about using innovation and incorporating lived experience to design new and effective community responses to suicide.

Kathryn McLachlan: Kath is the Lived Experience Research Officer in the Under the Radar project at the Black Dog Institute. Kath’s role is to evaluate the process of co-design being used in the project to engage; people with lived experience, community organisations and key stakeholders, in designing an alternative model of care for people, especially men, experiencing thoughts of ending their life. She has a strong background in experiential learning, research and community development. Kath’s lived experience is through her daughter’s death by suicide.