Paramedic PapersHome Mental health (patients) Building a prehospital suicidal-ideation policy from scratch
Mental health (patients)
Building a prehospital suicidal-ideation policy from scratch
The Evaluation and Management of Patients With Suicidal Ideation or Behavior by Emergency Medical Services
Crisis · 2026-10-09 · Added 10 October 2026
A Los Angeles County EMS quality improvement committee developed a comprehensive prehospital policy for suicidal ideation and behaviour after identifying gaps in standardised terminology, risk assessment, disposition support and safety planning.
- Study type
- Other
- Design
- Quality improvement initiative report
- Participants
- Single county EMS system; clinician and ED survey samples not reported
- Main finding
- Five improvement domains identified: standardised terminology, evidence-based risk assessment, disposition decision support, safety planning protocols, and law-enforcement collaboration; no validated prehospital suicide screening instruments were found
- Caveat
- Single US county system with no evaluation of the policy's effectiveness yet
- Bottom line
- Context only
Why it matters in Australia (Medium relevance). The US legal and law-enforcement context differs, but the core problems — no validated prehospital suicide risk screening tools and inconsistent disposition decisions — are universal.
Learning goal
Understand the system factors that shape safe prehospital assessment and disposition of patients with suicidal ideation.
More
- Topic: Mental health (patients)
- Daily scan: 10 October 2026
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