Creating Safe & Effective Spaces for Suicide Risk Disclosure in Routine Care

Suicide remains a major public health concern in the United States. In 2023, 49,316 people died by suicide - about one death every 11 minutes. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) also reports that 12.8 million adults seriously thought about suicide, 3.7 million made a suicide plan, and 1.5 million attempted suicide. Rates are equally concerning among adolescents, with 10% of high school students reporting a suicide attempt in the past year. Routine health care settings are, therefore, an important point of contact for suicide prevention. Many people who later die by suicide have seen a health professional in the year before death, and primary care contact is especially common. At the same time, risk is often invisible unless patients feel safe enough to talk about it. In routine care, one of the most important tasks is not simply identifying who may be at risk, but creating conditions in which disclosure becomes more likely.