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Roots of Hope: A community suicide prevention project
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Roots of Hope is a multi-site, community-led project that aims to reduce the impacts of suicide within communities across Canada. The project builds upon community expertise to implement suicide prevention interventions that are tailored to the local context. It will lead to the development of an evidence base, including best practices and suicide prevention guidelines and tools, to support the scale up and implementation of a “made-in-Canada” model across the country.
The 5 Pillars
The Roots of Hope model provides structure around which communities can tailor their suicide prevention efforts to meet their unique needs. Communities develop strategies and activities in each pillar and implement these simultaneously. These include:
Training and networks
Training and learning opportunities for healthcare providers such as physicians and nurse practitioners as well as community gatekeepers such as first responders, human resource staff and teachers.
Public awareness campaigns
- Locally-driven campaigns to promote mental health awareness (posters, brochures, social media etc.) and collaboration with the media. Follow these practices to create an effective suicide prevention awareness campaign and have safer conversations about suicide on social media.
- Talking to Children About a Suicide – A conversation tool to help caregivers, parents, and guardians understand how to speak with children in their lives suicide when a suicide happens in the community or if someone they know has died by suicide.
Means safety
Identification of the methods or places where a high number of suicides occur and implementation of measures to ensure safe access to them. For example, building barriers on bridges or at railway crossings, protocols for medication access and more. Follow these practices to keep your loved ones safe and help reduce suicides by creating a safer home.
Research
Setting of research priorities, surveillance and monitoring and evaluation of the project.
Communities in Newfoundland and Labrador,New Brunswick, Saskatchewan, Alberta and Ontario and Nunavut, have signed on with more provinces anticipated to announce their participation.
Roots of Hope Videos Launch – a video series featuring interviews with communities participating in the Roots of Hope demonstration project and MHCC employees on their experiences with suicide prevention and the importance of Roots of Hope. This series also includes several speeches from MHCC leadership team at the Roots of Hope project launch event.
For more information, email us at rootsofhope@mentalhealthcommission.ca