Skip to main content

Table 1 Choose Life: Principles, Objectives and Priority Groups

From: Measuring the tail of the dog that doesn't bark in the night: the case of the national evaluation of Choose Life (the national strategy and action plan to prevent suicide in Scotland)

Guiding principles

• Shared responsibility (across Scottish Executive departments, sectors, agencies and organisational boundaries)

• Effective leadership (nationally and locally

• Taking a person-centred approach (recognising variation in individuals' experiences, often associated with key life stages)

• Focus on priority approach (without losing sight of the broader needs of society as a whole)

• Continuous quality improvement (drawing on, and developing, better information and evidence of what works)

Main objectives

• Early prevention and intervention

• Responding to immediate crisis

• Longer-term work to provide hope and support recovery

• Coping with suicidal behaviour and completed suicide

• Promoting greater public awareness and encouraging people to seek help early

• Supporting the media

• Knowing what works

Priority groups

• Children (especially looked after children)

• Young people (especially young men)

• People with mental health problems (particularly service users and people with severe mental illness)

• People who attempt suicide

• People affected by the aftermath of suicidal behaviour

• People who abuse substances

• People in prison

• People who are recently bereaved

• People who have recently lost employment or who have been unemployed for a period of time

• People in isolated or rural communities

• People who are homeless