Michigan Department of Health and Human Services
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Website:
Funding Amount:
- FY20: $870,000
- FY21: $870,000
- FY22: $1,003,000
Focus Populations:
Males 25+ years
Michigan’s Suicide Prevention Strategies and Approaches

Create protective environments
Reduce access to lethal means among persons at risk for suicide
Organizational policies and culture

Improve access and delivery of suicide care
Safer suicide care through system change
Reduce provider shortages in underserved areas

Identify and support people at risk
Gatekeeper training

Lessen harms and prevent future risk
Safe reporting and messaging about suicide
- Promoting, sponsoring, and hosting gatekeeper trainings, such as Assessing and Managing Suicide Risk (AMSR) and Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST), to community gatekeepers statewide, including:
- Working with the Michigan Department of Corrections to implement policies related to suicide prevention, and facilitate gatekeeper trainings among mental and physical health providers to improve response to the corrections population as well as correctional staff who have expressed suicidal ideation
- Increasing the capacity to host gatekeeper trainings by hosting “training for trainers” to create a greater number of available trainers statewide
- Reducing access to lethal means among people at risk by distributing and promoting gun locks and safe storage messages at gatekeeper trainings
- Launching and promoting Man Therapy Michigan, a website that serves as a mental health and suicide prevention intervention for working age adult men and provides information and resources for mental health, coping, resilience, and connection to services
- Developing and disseminating safe messaging standards for reporting on suicide as well as safe messaging for social media, and working with mass communications departments at universities statewide to ensure safe messaging guidelines are taught and applied
- Reducing provider shortages by developing and disseminating a telemental health toolkit that providers can use statewide to provide quality suicide care on virtual platforms for potential increases in access and use of telemental health services
Prevention in Action
“Michigan’s Comprehensive Suicide Prevention (CSP) program, Preventing Suicide in Michigan Men (PRiSMM), brings together key individuals, organizations, and stakeholders to form the PRiSMM Partnership, which works to prevent suicide in Michigan men, a population that is at disproportionate risk for suicide. PRiSMM includes organizations in the construction, automotive, farming, and television and media industries, as well as the faith community.”
A key component of comprehensive suicide prevention is establishing a multi-sectoral partnership to help address suicide. Michigan’s Comprehensive Suicide Prevention (CSP) program, Preventing Suicide in Michigan Men (PRiSMM), brings together key individuals, organizations, and stakeholders to form the PRiSMM Partnership, which works to prevent suicide in Michigan men, a population that is at disproportionate risk for suicide. PRiSMM includes organizations in the construction, automotive, farming, and television and media industries, as well as the faith community. It includes individuals invested in reducing male suicides but who may not work in the suicide prevention field, as well as individuals working in agriculture, automotive, and construction industries who are able to inform the PRiSMM Partnership of gaps and barriers in suicide messaging. Many of the individuals involved in PRisMM interact with adult men and provide the perspective of Michigan men to help further the work of the overall project.
One of PRiSMM’s non-traditional partners oversees Michigan’s largest construction company. As a result of their participation in PRiSMM, this company plans to implement strategies to improve mental health and suicide prevention among its employees. This partner has also been able to provide insight on how PRiSMM’s suicide prevention messaging can reach Michigan men who work in construction.
PRiSMM shares data and information across a wide network. PRiSMM created a suicide prevention social media guide, a risk factors and warning signs guide, and data presentations to disseminate and inform the PRiSMM Partnership about suicide data and suicide prevention efforts that could be and are implemented in Michigan. PRiSMM also creates and disseminates a quarterly newsletter to keep the Partnership informed of data trends and prevention efforts. The PRiSMM Partnership has pushed a community-driven approach to implementation of suicide prevention efforts, and this approach is critical to the success of suicide prevention among Michigan men.
- Comprehensive Suicide Prevention: Program Profiles
- California Department of Public Health
- Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment
- Connecticut Department of Public Health
- Louisiana Department of Health
- Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention
- Massachusetts Department of Public Health
- ›Michigan Department of Health and Human Services
- North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services
- Tennessee Department of Health
- University of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania)
- Vermont Department of Health