Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2012, 9, 24-32; doi:10.3390/ijerph9010024 OPEN ACCESS International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ISSN 1660-4601 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph Article Essential Questions on Suicide Bereavement and Postvention Karl Andriessen 1,* and Karolina Krysinska 2 1 Suicide Prevention Program of the Flemish Community Mental Health Centres, 9000 Gent, Belgium 2 Unit for Clinical Psychology Research, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Catholic University Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium; E-Mail: karolina.krysinska@ppw.kuleuven.be * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-Mail: karl.andriessen@pandora.be; Tel.: +32-9-233-5099. Received: 8 November 2011; in revised form: 12 December 2011 / Accepted: 21 December 2011 / Published: 27 December 2011 Abstract: During the past decades public and research interest in postvention, i.e., support for families and communities after a suicide, has increased. However, the postvention field is still facing a number of important challenges and questions. This article aims to discuss a series of essential issues on suicide bereavement and postvention, regarding the current state of the art and future developments. Who is a suicide survivor and how many suicide survivors are there? Is suicide bereavement different from other types of bereavement? What are the needs of suicide survivors and what is postvention from a clinical perspective and from a public health perspective? Can postvention be prevention? With this last question, the article concludes with a series of recommendations in order to strengthen the potential of postvention as prevention. Keywords: suicide; prevention; postvention; bereavement; public health; policy 1. Introduction Any discussion of suicide, a serious public health problem claiming globally approximately one million victims per year, will be incomplete without taking into consideration the perspective of the bereaved, or in other word, the suicide survivors. Their number is significantly higher than the number of suicide victims and some of the survivors have to cope with serious and long lasting psycho-social sequelae of the loss, including increased risk of suicidality. Although a wide range of