Since 2022, VPQHC has partnered with emergency departments across Vermont to strengthen care for individuals experiencing suicidal thoughts or behaviors.
Through the Suicide Prevention in Emergency Departments Quality Improvement Initiative, VPQHC supports hospital teams in developing and improving evidence-informed clinical workflows, strengthening workforce readiness, and embedding suicide care best practices into everyday emergency department operations.
Implementing reliable, high-quality suicide care is an ongoing process. It requires thoughtful planning, testing, refinement, and reinforcement as staff, workflows, organizational needs, and available data change over time. Teams may move through this process over several years, progressing from initial assessment and planning to implementation, continuous improvement, and long-term sustainment.
Resources developed through this initiative can be found below.
Suicide Prevention in Emergency Departments Implementation Toolkit
This toolkit reflects the initiative’s longitudinal, learning-based approach to improving suicide care. It is designed to support emergency department and hospital teams wherever they are in their implementation journey, from assessing current practices and developing reliable workflows to measuring progress and sustaining improvements over time.
Suicide Prevention in Emergency Departments Video
A look inside Vermont’s statewide effort to strengthen suicide-safer care in emergency departments through collaboration and evidence-based practices.
Learn how hospitals across Vermont are working together to strengthen suicide-safer care in emergency departments. This video highlights the Suicide Prevention in the ED Quality Improvement Initiative—a statewide effort driven by collaboration, evidence-based practices, and a shared commitment to compassionate, and effective, care.
Essential Elements of a Suicide Care Pathway
A framework to guide safer, more effective, and coordinated suicide care across healthcare settings.
The Essential Elements of a Suicide Care Pathway offer a clear framework to help healthcare organizations provide safer, more effective, and more coordinated care for individuals at risk of suicide. Designed to support system-wide improvement, the resource promotes alignment with best practices in suicide care.
More Resources:
