Post Suicide Bereavement Support

The rate of deaths by suicide is 9.1 per 100,000 (3 year average, 2013-15) in Cambridgeshire, equating to 155 deaths across the 3 years. By 2020/21, the Five Year Forward View for Mental Health set the ambition that the number of people taking their own lives will be reduced by 10% nationally compared to 2016/17 levels. Locally there is an ambition to strive for 'Zero Suicides'.

A range of work is being undertaken locally to prevent deaths by suicide, coordinated by the multi-agency suicide prevention group. Friends and relatives of people who die by suicide have a 1 in 10 risk of making a suicide attempt after their loss. A conservative estimate is that 10 people are directly affected by each suicide death. The lasting impact can be huge in terms of their own health outcomes, isolation and work/education. Research by Prof Julie Cerel found that 130 people directly knew the person with 25 of these being in a great deal of distress and needing services and support to get through intense emotions.

As part of the implementation of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Suicide Prevention Strategy a post-suicide bereavement service was set up in 2017.