The name CORESTM came after much discussion, with an emphasis on the Community aspect of what we wanted to do. We believe this is the only model of its type to be developed in this manner. Therefore, in preparing to launch the CORESTM (Community Response to Eliminating Suicide) project it was important to look at the best way to reach the community and to ensure that our passion towards hope and healing was going to be understood and well received by the community as a whole. As an important part of what we wanted to achieve was to give to people the ability to “do something” when they came across somebody who showed the signs. All too often people have said, “I saw the signs”, but I did not know what to do. Well, this journey was about educating people as to what to do.

As the name suggests, the Elimination of suicide was the object of CORESTM, and with this aim in sight the project set about having a zero suicide rate for Kentish. The journey was going to take us just under two years to complete.

The Journey is told as a series of questions and statements, as to why we did what we did and hopefully this will give others the ideas of what we achieved through this project. Please read and absorb and hopefully you too may travel this journey in the near future.

It was decided to launch the project with a dinner function and included a wide range of representatives from the community that we envisaged would be involved and work with us, and themselves to achieve the aims and objectives of the project.

The aim of a formal launch of the project was to gain the support of people in the community who both had an interest in suicide issues and were those who worked in and amongst the community, such as the local pharmacist, local shop keepers, etc, who came into contact with people on a regular basis. in other words those who were in contact with people on a regular basis.

The dinner was not only well attended, it gave an initial “kick start” to the project, with people being briefed on the project aimed to achieve.

The formation of a community group was vital for the project to achieve its goal of eliminating suicide, so it was at the launch that an invitation was extended to those interested in forming the CORESTM Team.
The idea was to target the key people in the community and train them to identify and read the signs of suicide and to then to work together as an ongoing network throughout the community monitoring and being involved actively in suicide prevention. We needed to equip the team with skills to be able to identify those at risk, being able read the signs and then work with those at risk, as well as providing the team members with support from the team leaders and each other.

The other element, which was important for the members of the team, was that other training would be given in areas such as, how to refer people at risk onto the appropriate bodies, how to network effectively, communication skills and dealing with conflict situations. These additional skills allowed the team to grow during the project, to a point where they were an affective team within the community and the general community knew who they were.

It was always our “dream” to have the community work together in order to achieve our goal and for the project to be successful it was important to involve the community, not only as part of the CORESTM team, in the training and education provided.

The project’s success depended on having community ownership of the program. We were aware of many occasions where groups from outside the community and delivered training, but then left. The community was to be empowered and skilled so the project would continue long after the training.

Community people who had an interest helping form a stronger, more resilient community. Most people knew the effect suicide had on their family, friends and the wider community. These people came from across the wide spectrum of the community, and involved people who not only worked in the community (such as other health professionals), but people from service clubs, shop keepers, carers and volunteers. Those who had a genuine interest became the team that formed the backbone of the project.

The team met for the first time on the 14th April 2003, and has continued to meet monthly since then. The team has 50 people registered who attend the meetings and training sessions.  This community group has worked together to highlight the problem of suicide by bringing the issues into the open for the community to deal with.

An important part of this project was training the CORESTM team members and the community in general. The objective was to train 150 people (including the CORES team members) to try and reach as large a cross section of the community as possible and therefore enhance our chances of intervention and prevention of those people at risk of suicide.

When deciding who would be trained we looked at our target group which included all age groups so with this in mind we chose to send the Manager of Kentish Health and a young community member, a 20 year old male who had shown a keen interest in the
CORESTM project. The young community member had lost two of his friends to suicide and as a well known local identify fitted the criteria as a leader.

Training the CORESTM team was important for several reasons, as we needed to build the confidence of members and to produce a stable support network that could work together under pressure and when their skills were needed. Therefore, it was important to ensure that the team work well together and within the community.
Team training consisted of;

• Team Building
• Setting Boundaries and Referring
• Listening Skills and Resources
• Guest Speaker overview of The Good Grief Workshop
• Critical Incident Debriefing
• Suicide Postvention
• Good Grief Workshop (full day)
• Team Folders and training suggestion
• Stress Management
• Lost for Words Workshop (full day)
• First Aid
• Promotion of CORESTMTraining

Team building (which in turn means community building) formed an important part of the project, as it is vital that everyone is works together and follows a similar path. Support and encouragement for each other and the community is what has made this program work.

To achieve this it was important to educate team members in issues other than suicide, team building exercises, communication, listening skills, looking after oneself. When working with a group of people who do not work or socialize with each other it is important that differences are identified and the trust of the team is built both between and within each other. Without this team building the project would not have been the success it was.

When we commenced the project it was commonly believed that discussing suicide amongst the general public would only encourage the practice.

We decided to challenge this myth embarking upon a community advertising program to raise awareness of issues surrounding suicide and encourage members of the community to join the team.
This community promotion had a staggering affect as community members described a “healing’ process
Many people who undertook the courses offered in the project came to help themselves with personal healing after the experiences they had had with suicide.  The overall affect on the local community was positive from all angles.  There were no “downsides

An important part of the project was the ability of community members who required assistance was a contact with somebody they could talk to. Apart from the community members and the CORESTM team members the 24 hour, 7 day counseling service played a large part in being the contact with people who had suicidal thoughts or tendencies. When we commenced the project we were told by many experts that suicide was not a topic which should be discussed amongst the general public, as this would only encourage the practice. Therefore, it was with some reserve that we embarked upon a community advertising program to encourage members of the community to join in. The outcome was staggering, as this advertising did not encourage people to suicide, but rather to openly discuss what had been happening over previous years and a great deal of community healing took place.
Many people who undertook the courses offered in the project came to be personal healing from experiences they had had with suicide. The overall affect on the local community was positive from all angles. There were no “downsides”.

There are many stories of people undertaking the training and then using their new skills. It is often said that within three months of the training you will utilize the new skills you have acquired.

One particular story from the project is that of one participant who had never had anything to do with suicide prevention training using these skills twice within two weeks of completing the training.

The first was the night after the training had been completed, and a phone call from a relative led to the identification of suicidal thoughts. Within an hour the person had agreed to seek help and was duly treated for depression and has now started to take steps in their lives to recovery. Again, at a conference, the subject came up and within a short time the participant was dealing with another case of somebody with suicidal thoughts. Again help was found and the person had now recovered. Will you use the training? You will never know until it may be too late.

At the time of writing this journey we are one month from the “official” close of the project. To date there have not been any suicides in Kentish since the program began, just under two years ago.
Further more, there have been nine preventions of suicides during this period.

That means nine people are still alive today that would have otherwise taken their lives. We will leave it to you to decide if the project has been successful?

When we commenced the journey, we had set ourselves a goal within a time frame. That was to eliminate suicide in Kentish over the two years of the project. We have achieved this goal and in some ways the journey has come to an end.
However, when we commenced the journey we also knew there would be no real end. The issue of suicide has always been with us, and the journey will never end in saving the lives of those people who have came to a stage where they feel life is no longer worth living. Now we want to expand our journey to other communities, to help heal and make whole those lives in need of support and love.