Could Your Employee Newsletter for Health and Workplace Wellness Help Prevent Suicide?

Suicide prevention certainly is a worthy goal, but why am I so surprised by how many people don't believe they have much of a role in this ageless problem? Suicide prevention is a lot like marketing products and services, you want to give suicidal persons a reason for buy into life. But the sale shouldn't be attempted necessary at only the moment of greatest need, but also discussed over a period of years in subtle whys that supply resilience to the would be suicidal person. This is accomplished with education about suicide, tips on helping suicidal person, signs and symptoms of suicidal planning or "ideation, and done so long before suicidal planning or ideation begins. Suicidal persons don't necessarily want to kill themselves. Instead, they just want the pain to stop. This reality supports the argument for help all employees develop resilience for when the going gets tough.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, there are about 121 suicides per day in the United States.  That's about one suicide ever 12 minutes. That is actually an improvement over 2003 when I wrote the "Helping to Prevent Suicide Program" where the statistics were one suicide every eight minutes. Your employee health and wellness newsletter is a tool that save lives. Here are seven reasons why, and how you can make sure you newsletter is doing its job.