By Patrick Mcardle
patrick.mcardle @rutlandherald.com
Supported by a three-year grant from the Bowse Health Trust, several Southern Vermont health care organizations are working together to bring the Rutland Safe Suicide Care Project to the local community in pursuit of the goal of eliminating suicide in Rutland County.
During Thursday’s Project VISION meeting, JoEllen Tarallo, executive director of the Center for Health and Learning, said suicide was a “priority health issue,” especially right now in Vermont.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 112 suicides in 2017, making it the 19th highest-incidence state for suicides.
“We are in an upward trend, not only here in Vermont but nationally on suicide. It’s a public health issue and we need to address it just like we try to address cardio-vascular disease, just like we try to address tobacco use, and I think we’re going to have to address marijuana use, and opiate use,” she said.
Tarallo said the rate of suicides in Vermont in 2014 made it the highest in New England.
“What we think is that every two to three days somebody in this state dies by suicide. Not only is it a loss of life but it has an incredible ripple effect on families and the community around that person so when we prevent one suicide, we’re providing a whole onset of mental health issues and concerns that are therefore needing to be addressed by families and community services,” she said.
Tarallo described suicide as what can happen when someone has lost the ability to cope, while mental health is the ability to cope “with complex issues and emotions in our life.”
Dr. Jeff McKee, who is on the board of the Bowse Health Trust, said the projects chosen for funding meet two criteria: They address one of the issues identified in a community needs assessment and from input from the clinicians who work for the Rutland health care system.
“This made perfect sense for the Bowse Health Trust to fund, the particular initiative around the Zero Suicide,” he said.
The project is a collaboration between the Center, in Brattleboro, Rutland Regional Medical Center, Rutland Mental Health Services and the Community Health Center of the Rutland Region.
A handout distributed at the meeting said the Safe Suicide Care project would “reduce barriers to accessing suicide safe care in the Rutland area by identifying system gaps and opportunities, building infrastructure for a collaborative, integrated system of care and improving knowledge and skills among behavioral health providers, primary care practitioners and hospital inpatient and Emergency Departments in the Rutland area.”
Using “Zero Suicide,” which consists of seven principles and practices, the Suicide Safer Care program will train mental health providers to screen people who might be suicidal and find the right pathway to care and recovery for that person.
The project is also intended to develop “gatekeepers,” which Tarallo described as anyone who recognizes the warning signs of suicide, knows what to say and do and knows how to get help.
Christi Anderson, senior director of social work at Rutland Regional Medical Center, said her ideal goal would be for everyone in the Rutland area to go through the training.
“That is really, I think, the message today is as a community how can we get people committed to this, engaged in this,” she said.
Anderson said she expected the “next big push” for the project was to begin offering the community training.
Tarallo told the group at Project VISION that she noted a range of activities and projects that were being developed in the Rutland area.
“That is the best suicide prevention for your community because underlying every protective factor for suicide is connection, connection within a person to their own resources, connection to other people in their community, better connections in families, better connections with institutions, faith communities, with parent/child centers. All of those are protective factors so keep up the good work, Rutland. I love coming to these meetings. It’s like a feel-good meeting when you’re in my field anyway,” she said.
Tarallo also pointed out that as the meeting was going on, more than 75 youths and a dozen adult facilitators were meeting in Rutland for the “You Matter” Youth and Young Adult Mental Health Promotion Program. About half a dozen students from Rutland High School were expected to be at the event and bring back what they learned to other Rutland students.
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