title: Suicide Response Guidelines for Residency Trainees: A Novel Postvention Response for the Care and Teaching of Psychiatry Residents who Encounter Suicide in Their Patients.
abstract: Suicide is an event that is almost universally encountered by psychiatrists and psychiatry residents. Because psychiatric patients are at a higher risk for completing suicide than patients of other specialties, psychiatry residents are at risk for experiencing the suicide of a patient during their training. A review of the literature shows that there is continually growing research into the negative emotional effects of patient suicides on psychiatry residents and the need for clear response protocols when a suicide occurs, also known as postvention protocols. However, there are no Graduate Medical Education requirements to specifically train psychiatry residents about this, even with a well-voiced desire by residents to receive this training. In the National Capitol Consortium Psychiatry Residency, encounters with patient suicides by residents in a time of war led us to a place in which interventions were designed and instituted to care for the caregiver, in this case focusing on psychiatry trainees. Our process and product, described here, offers an example of a systematic postvention response. It addresses aspects of what is known in the research base, combined with acknowledgement of the human response and the institutional need for a consistent and objective response.
authors.affiliation: National Capital Consortium Psychiatry Residency, Bethesda, MD, USA, elisea.avalos@med.navy.mil.
authors.forename: Paulette T
authors.initials: PT
authors.lastname: Cazares
authors.forename: Patcho
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Santiago
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Moulton
authors.forename: Scott
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Moran
authors.forename: Albert
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tsai
mesh_terms: D004503:Education, Medical, Graduate / Q000379:methods* / Q000458:organization & administration; D017408:Guidelines as Topic; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination / Q000379:methods; D008890:Military Psychiatry / Q000193:education*; D010820:Physicians / Q000523:psychology*; D011570:Psychiatry / Q000193:education; D012944:Social Support; D013405:Suicide