Each week, a programmer will use Epic/Clarity data to identify adult outpatients who completed a PHQ depression questionnaire in the previous week and reported thoughts of death or self-harm "most of the days" or "nearly every day". This trial will be limited to patients receiving care from one of the three participating health systems.
Those identified will be automatically assigned to continued Usual Care or to one of two intervention programs (Care Management or Skills Training).
The Care Management intervention includes periodic outreach to assess ongoing risk of suicide attempt and as-needed care management to facilitate engagement in ongoing outpatient follow-up. Contacts will occur by secure messaging (with the option of telephone outreach for those who do not read messages). Each contact will include a request to complete a new risk assessment questionnaire (the abbreviated Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale used at each site) unless a risk assessment was recently documented in the medical record. Using an algorithm tested in pilot studies, the Care Manager will determine appropriate timing of follow-up and (if not already scheduled) communicate with the participant to facilitate appropriate follow-up care. Time between outreach contacts will vary from 2 weeks to 2 months, depending on the most recent risk assessment. Outreach contacts will continue up to 12 months. All outreach contacts will be documented in the Epic electronic health record in the same manner as any other mental health clinical contacts. The Care Manager(s) will be licensed mental health clinician(s) with experience in suicide risk assessment, supervised by site specific clinician investigators. A detailed protocol for the Care Management program (including sample messages) is included with this application.
The Skills Training intervention is an online program intended to teach specific skills for emotion regulation and crisis management. The content of the program is derived from Dialectical Behavior Therapy, an evidence-based psychotherapy designed for people at risk for suicide attempts. The program includes four modules or chapters, each focused on a specific skill. Each chapter includes written and video didactic instruction, video examples, in-vivo practice, and written homework exercises. The program will be supported by a Coach who will send periodic messages (via Epic secure messaging) encouraging use of the program and practice of specific skills. Coaching messages will be scheduled every 1-3 weeks during the first 3 months of the program and every 1-3 months over the following 9 months (varying according to each participant's level of participation and progress in the program). All coaching messages will be documented in the Epic electronic health record in the same manner as any other mental health clinical contacts. The Coach(es) will be licensed mental health clinician(s) supervised by site specific clinician investigators. The online program will be delivered by a secure website (KP Washington Health Research Institute's DatStat server), and participants will reach the program using encrypted personalized links sent to them via Epic secure messaging. This trial does not have open enrollment, please see the public facing website at www.NowMattersNow.org
Those assigned to Usual Care will not be contacted.
For all patients in all three intervention groups, a site programmer will extract data from the Virtual Data Warehouse to identify probable suicide attempts over 18 months following randomization.
