Mental health articles

Collaborative Assessment and Management of Suicidality This approach is a novel clinical protocol designed to quickly identify and effectively engage suicidal outpatients in their own clinical care (Jobes, 2000, 2003b; Jobes & Drozd, 2004). The approach taken by collaborative assessment and management of suicidality (CAMS) emphasizes a thorough and collaborative assessment of suicidality at every session and a problem-solving approach to treatment planning. In effect, the clinician and suicidal patient coauthor a treatment plan that constructs viable ways of coping and living. The heart of CAMS is a strong therapeutic alliance, where both parties work together to develop a shared phenomenological understanding of the patient’s suicidality. From this perspective, clinicians approach suicidality in an empathic, matter-of-fact and nonjudgmental fashion, appreciating the viability and attraction of suicide as a coping option. The aim is to understand what it means for the patient to be suicidal, and with that shared knowledge to determine how to clinically manage the risk (Jobes, Wong, Conrad, Drozd, & Beal-Walden, 2005).

Tags: suicide