Eliminating the stigma associated with mental illness and preparing health care providers to diagnose potential victims are among the efforts needed to combat the problem, Satcher said.
Many suicides are already preventable.
By the time most people who contemplate suicide come to the attention of our current medical system it is much too late. The strategy consists of 81 recommendations, including increasing research, reducing barriers to treatment, expanding insurance coverage of mental health and substance abuse treatment, establishing workplace prevention programs and improving depression screening. More than 70 percent of people who commit suicide had seen a doctor within 30 days of their deaths, Satcher said. Nearly 31,000 people take their lives each year and another 775,000 attempt suicide, Satcher said. The national strategy resulted from a four-day conference of more than 450 doctors, counselors, educators and victims' family members who gathered in Reno, Nev., this past weekend.