Earlier this year, healthcare professionals from many states came together at meetings organized by the National Health Care CEO Council on Gun Violence Prevention and Safety to focus on the implementation of evidence-based firearm injury prevention strategies. Working with the Ad Council, the CEO council is deploying a campaign to address the issue, shifting away from divisive, politically charged conversations and instead focusing on approaches that have proven effective.
On June 6, just ahead of the 10th annual National Gun Violence Awareness Day, many of the same healthcare leaders and other organizations were invited to the White House to further discuss the challenges.
Health systems and hospitals across the country see firsthand the physical and mental health toll firearm injuries have on their communities. Both healthcare workers and first responders serve on the front lines, with behavioral health providers at their sides, all caring for patients with these injuries. Together they treat tens of thousands of such cases annually.
While tackling the issue of firearm safety may be a daunting task, healthcare providers have found common ground and broad agreement on several paths forward.
Related: As violence worsens, providers seek to balance security, patient care
Making progress through collaboration
The Intermountain West region sits in what is known as the “Suicide Belt,” a term coined by University of Nevada, Las Vegas, sociologist Matt Wray in the early 2000s. He found that the suicide rate in that region was higher than the rest of the country due to several social factors. One of the main reasons is the easy access to firearms.
It’s not that there are more suicide attempts — but rather that firearms are highly lethal compared to other most widely used methods of attempt. Sadly, the youth population is increasingly prone to suicide ideation and often has ready access to firearms.
Since the Intermountain West has a high rate of firearm ownership, one of Intermountain Health’s first actions years ago was to work with local firearm advocacy groups and collaborate on a plan to distribute gun locks throughout the communities it serves. Gun locks hinder access and buy time; in a crisis, time is crucial to saving a life.
The time between when people decide to take their lives and then actually make an attempt is often extremely brief. Research shows that for 73% of those contemplating suicide, it’s less than three hours between their decision to die and their attempt.
That is why Intermountain Health’s community health team set a goal to get as many gun locks into as many households as possible, to give more time for people in crisis to reconsider, seek help, talk to a family member or friend, come to an emergency room or call 988, the national suicide hotline. We partnered with grocery stores, pharmacies and sporting goods stores to have gun locks sitting on counters to freely take. Community health teams also set up tables at gun shows to hand them out for free.
Intermountain has now distributed approximately 67,000 free gun locks since 2019 and is finding even more ways to distribute them.
Since the period of high risk is often so brief, any steps to increase the time and distance between a suicidal impulse and access to a firearm will reduce that suicide risk.
Boosting mental health resources
It is not enough to ask people to lock up their firearms and hope for the best. We also need to normalize the conversation about mental health.
Nearly all hospitals use Community Health Needs Assessments. In every assessment report for each hospital, mental health and suicide prevention are near the top of the most important areas that need to be addressed.
In recent years, Intermountain has helped train more than 57,000 first responders, caregivers, teachers and others on Counseling on Access to Lethal Means. The program teaches these professionals to use behavioral health tools to have discussions with an individual struggling with suicide ideation, with the goal for them to voluntarily give their gun(s) to a friend or family member while they seek help.
In the end, these efforts are not an anti-firearm approach — instead, they are a philosophy developed in collaboration with firearm owners and advocates in our communities.
We understand people have differing views about firearm ownership, and we are all unique individuals with unique ideologies, but we can agree on one thing: We all want to keep our loved ones and neighbors as safe as possible in a moment of suicide ideation by buying time and creating distance to firearms.
Rob Allen is president and CEO of Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Health and a member of the National Health Care CEO Council on Gun Violence Prevention and Safety.
