The American Academy of Nursing (AAN) has released policy recommendations from a panel it convened last year to address the nurse suicide rate, which it says is higher than in the general population and represents both a workforce safety crisis and systemic failure.
Among the panel’s recommendations are:
- Sustain funding and implementation of the Dr. Lorna Breen Health Care Provider Protection Act, which supports suicide prevention resources, training materials, and initiatives for clinicians and health systems.
- Address licensing and credentialing barriers that include invasive questions about mental health that discourage nurses from getting help.
- Use an impairment standard for licensing that addresses mental health only if the clinician cannot practice safely.
- Make suicide prevention and substance use recovery part of workforce safety.
- Increase the availability of confidential mental health resources.
- Increase privacy protections of nurses’ health information, including for those facing disciplinary proceedings.
- Use suicide experts to help develop policies.
- Increase funding for research of nurse suicide.
AAN’s Building Health Care System Excellence Expert Panel collaborated with its Psychiatric, Mental Health, and Substance Use and Acute & Critical Care Expert Panels in convening the meeting in September. Titled “Shifting the Future: Policy and Research Updates on Suicide in the Nursing Profession” it brought together experts in nurse suicide prevention to discuss research, risk identification and initiatives. It published its findings this month and made the proceedings available here.
Among the key takeaways that led to the recommendations:
- Nurses’ suicide rates are higher compared to the broader population
- The higher suicide rates represent both a workplace safety crisis and a systemic failure “driven by stigma, lack of confidentiality, punitive cultures, and lack of sufficient access to effective mental health care.”
- Healthier work environments are needed and suicide prevention must incorporated into well-being initiatives.
