FISP

Family Intervention for Suicide Prevention (FISP)

Requirements for Participation

Practicing clinicians providing treatment services to children and families in Fairfax County, Virginia or clinical supervisors of clinicians offering these services.

The FISP Training is offered in partnership with the UCLA-Duke Act, Support, and Protect (ASAP) Center (https://www.asapnctsn.org). As described by the Suicide Prevention Resource Center, "the Family Intervention for Suicide Prevention (FISP) is a cognitive behavioral family intervention for youth ages 10-24 who are presenting with suicidal ideation or a recent suicide attempt. The FISP uses the encounter with the clinician to decrease the short- term risk of repeated suicidal ideation and behavior by building the coping skills of youth and their families, enhancing motivation for follow-up mental health treatment, and improving linkage to outpatient follow-up treatment services.

The FISP has three main objectives: (1) Staff training; (2) Youth and family crisis therapy session; and (3) Care linkage telephone contacts. It emphasizes: “reframing the suicide attempt as a problem requiring action”; providing psychoeducation to families about the importance of outpatient mental health treatment and restriction of means of attempt in the home; increasing family support; and working with the youth to identify their triggers for suicidality and develop a safety plan (“hope box” to enhance safe and adaptive coping).

The FISP has been tested in ED settings and adapted for use in the homes of youth/families in other settings (e.g., inpatient, residential, outpatient, school, other community programs). The FISP has also been adapted for delivery as a home-based intervention for youth with "suicide incidents" in the Celebrating Life Program, developed to address suicide attempts by youth within the White Mountain Apache community."

To learn more about this intervention and see associated publications, go to: https://www.sprc.org/resources-programs/family-intervention-suicide-prevention-fisp

Trainers: Dr. David Goldston, Dr. Joan Asarnow, Dr. Adrienne Banny, Dr. Angela Tunno