Suicide Audit 2020-2024

The audit highlights several opportunities to strengthen the local suicide prevention system:

• Strengthen workforce capability by expanding suicide prevention training across frontline services - including primary care, emergency departments, social care, housing, criminal justice and the voluntary sector - with enhanced training for staff supporting higher risk groups.
• Improve access, responsiveness and continuity within mental health services by reviewing crisis pathways, addressing waiting lists, improving triage, strengthening follow-up, and involving families/carers more routinely.
• Enhance the role of primary care through improved identification, structured medication reviews, proactive follow-up for non-attendance, better coding, and stronger links with crisis and mental health teams.
• Improve data quality within coronial records to strengthen real time intelligence and better target interventions.
• Address broader social and economic risks by ensuring timely support for housing, employment, financial stress, trauma, and domestic abuse.
• Promote safety planning and means restriction, focusing on the home environment and high-risk public locations.
• Develop community based and targeted support, including crisis cafés, men’s mental health groups, bereavement support, and interventions for groups at increased risk (e.g. middle-aged men, young women, people living alone, LGBTQ+ individuals, those with chronic illness, or criminal justice involvement).
• Strengthen governance by updating the local Suicide Reduction Action Plan with clear accountability and ensuring future audits take place more frequently to support continuous learning.