Based on over a decade of study with therapists of patients who killed themselves while in treatment, scientists in SPI’s Recognizing a Suicide Crisis (RISC) project have developed an instrument, the Affective States Questionnaire (ASQ), that holds the promise of being able to tell if someone is in a suicide crisis i.e., at acute risk for suicide. The absence of such an instrument has been a major handicap in treating patients who may be at risk. Past work on the project has demonstrated the role of intense affective states such as desperation, rage, guilt, hopelessness, and anxiety in triggering a suicide crisis. It has validated these findings with a comparison group that was comparably depressed but was never seriously suicidal. A major medical center has now completed an encouraging pilot test of the ASQ and is now implementing and testing the ASQ prospectively for its ability to recognize a suicide crisis. Confirmation of the retrospective findings in a prospective study would be of enormous value in informing us when to intervene actively because patients are at imminent risk for suicide.
Recognizing an Imminent Suicide Crisis (RISC)