- CBT Plus, for Suicide Prevention -

The course aims:​

• Above all, the aim of this course is to show how to help a suicidal person to build a life that they can see is genuinely more rewarding. To cover all aspects:
  • Behavioural, teaching what activities lead to the feeling that life is more rewarding, and helping the person develop those behaviours.
  • Biological, paying attention to factors such as diet, exercise and sleep, factors that help us feel good and also help regulate emotions.
  • Environmental, addressing the environment around the person to generate a positive as milieu as possible.
  • Social, helping develop positive relationships and minimise destructive ones.
  • Thinking style, so the person can see that their life is now more rewarding and develop tolerance for the distress that is part and parcel of most people’s experience.
  • All so that the person is left with a robust and rewarding life that can withstand substantial ‘knocks’ and still remain solid.
• Along the way, the course aims to highlight how there can be no better way to spend our professional time than to help people who are so distressed that they are thinking of ending their lives - to change the perception of suicide as something that is worrisome to something that is a clear opportunity to make a great impact.
• To provide a simple non-intrusive measure of progress while at the same time monitoring risk.
   

The course covers:​

• The nature of suicide: reckless suicide, 'out of the blue' suicide, 'I don't think he meant it' suicide, and others.
• The first treatment session: why it is so important: the relationship and assessment.
• Continuing risk management: How to keep the person safe while you give proper treatment to provide a long term solution. The weakness of a formal contract and the effectiveness of an informal contract.
• Case formulation: making sense of the information you have, and continuing to do so. Understanding why the person is suicidal.
• Key personality factors for the therapist: Persistence, Optimism and more. What to do if you only sometimes possess these factors.
• How to give hope for the future: the key ingredient that makes the difference between giving believable hope and unbelievable hope.
• What makes a life more rewarding? What research tells us are the five prevailing factors that lead to happiness.
• Idiosyncratic factors: not everyone fits in with the blanket factors that research tells us about. How to seek out the factors specific to your patient, and to work with them in a proper, evidence-based way.
• The 'damaged' individual – the person who feels that, because of what has happened to them, there can never be any hope for their future.
• The patient who says “There's just nothing to live for” and yet won't work towards improving their life.
• The reckless suicide: the person who killed themselves yet professionals say “he didn't really mean to do it”.
• Dealing with Loss, 1: the case of the banker who ended his life because he was down to his last £5million. Universal principles.
• Dealing with Loss, 2: the case of the man who is suicidal 15 years after his wife left him. Universal principles.
• What to do about recurring thoughts of shame, guilt and embarrassment.
• Difficult cases: where you can see that maybe it makes sense to consider suicide.
• “He surely didn't kill himself because he'd run out of toothpaste?” What to do about 'the last straw phenomenon'.
• Avoiding the potholes, 1: working with people who are just too lethargic to end their lives – until your intervention increases their energy levels.
• Avoiding the potholes, 2: the patient who is suddenly much more cheerful – because they've made up their mind to 'end their misery'.
• Beyond 'no longer a suicide risk' – making life more rewarding, and ensuring it stays that way.
• Working with suicide is exciting, fascinating, and immensely rewarding, yet it can also be stressful. How to manage that stress, especially in case of 'significant incidents'.

What the course will do for you:

• You will see that there can be no better way to spend your professional time than to help people who are so distressed that they are thinking of ending their lives. You will see a clear opportunity to make a great impact.
• You will be able to use the PMSRS structured interview to quickly obtain information across a range of important factors – and have guidelines about how to respond usefully.
• You will be able to measure progress in a simple, non-intrusive way, while at the same time monitoring risk. You will feel the reassurance given by this.
• You will be able to spot 'false dawns' and know how to avoid the dangers they pose.
• You will be able to handle the stresses - and enjoy the rewards – of working with suicide.
• Above all, you will be able to help suicidal people to build a life that they can see is genuinely more rewarding. You will be able to cover all aspects – behavioural, biological, environmental, social and cognitive – so that the person is left with a robust and rewarding life that can withstand substantial 'knocks' and still remain solid.
   

Who should attend:​

All professionals who sometimes work with people who are at risk of suicide, whether in residential facilities, outpatient facilities or in the community.

Note: the age of the people you see is immaterial, it is a fallacy that it is 'mainly young men' who take their own lives. Suicide is one of the top causes of death in young men because other illnesses are less prevalent at that age. Suicide itself however continues through the years.

Equally on gender, although some people make the point that three times as many men than women end their own lives in the UK, it is still the case that 1,540 women do so every year, a substantial figure.
 

What you receive as a result of attending the training:

All delegates are registered at APT as having attended the course, and receive a downloadable certificate to acknowledge their attendance, registration, and APT-Accreditation at the appropriate level. As a bona fide APT event, this course automatically has accreditation from The Association for Psychological Therapies. This accreditation is given weight by the fact of over 125,000 professionals having attended APT training.

Upon completion of this course (and exam), delegates will receive Level 2 APT accreditation in the subject.

Bookings:

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If you would like to be invoiced please email finance@apt.ac stating; the course title, how many places you require, your organisation's purchase order number, and the name and address for the invoice to be sent to.