Project Details
Relationship of Suicide Death to Baker Act Examinations, Client Characteristics and Service Use Patterns
Description
The study includes a secondary analysis of existing data sets (Medicaid, Baker Act and SAMH/IDS - from DCF) to identify people who were hospitalized for a suicide attempt and those who died by suicide during 2004-2006. The research team will examine a number of characteristics of the individuals themselves, patterns of service use (mental health and substance abuse) in a period before and after the attempt and prior to the death by suicide.
There is perhaps no worse outcome than suicide, making it a key policy concern generally. This study will allow for a better understanding of the services the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) funds via Medicaid and the extent to which they were used (or not used) by those who died by suicide. This study will allow for an understanding of patterns of services and how they are related to this negative outcome. Lack of service use for those who died by suicide and were enrolled in Medicaid would suggest problems with diagnosis and/or access to key services. Use of certain services that are related to suicide may suggest the need to more carefully address suicide for individuals accessing such services and/or address issues with the services themselves. The goal is to identify these issues in a way that will allow AHCA to use Medicaid funds in such a way that addresses reductions in suicides.