For the years 2008-2014, Jefferson County ranked 11th out of 50 peer counties in terms of highest rates of suicide.   This statistic inspired the Louisville Health Advisory Board - a cross-sector group of community organizations and leaders working to improve physical, mental and social well-being for residents of Louisville - to come together and set an objective to design and implement a community-wide, evidence-based and data-driven program to eliminate suicides in Louisville.

This group sought to save lives and help Louisville set a world record by training the most individuals in one week in the technique of Question, Persuade, Refer (QPR). Similar to CPR, QPR is a 90-minute training course designed to support an emergency response to someone in crisis, and it can save lives.

From September 9-15, there were 117 training events facilitated in 50 locations across the community - in community centers, colleges, churches, places of work and more.  Thank you to all our supporters, trainers and over 2,200 Louisvillians (wow!) who participated in the training.

Learn about the Louisville Mayor's encouragement of this initiative or check out our Frequently Asked Questions.

For questions about this initiative, please visit the Louisville Health Advisory Board Facebook page or email LouisvilleZeroSuicide@gmail.com. 

Please remember there are resources for you, family and friends related to suicide prevention.  The national suicide prevention hotline is 1-800-273-8255 and a local (Louisville) crisis line number at Centerstone (formerly Seven Counties) is 502-589-4313.

NEW!

Since the initiative in 2018, several communities have reached out to learn about the implementation so that they might consider something similar in their cities. This 1-hour webcast provides context about the Louisville Health Advisory Board Behavioral Health committee and its objective to design and implement a community-wide, evidence-based and data-driven program to eliminate suicides in Louisville, and provides detail on executing the Question, Persuade, Refer (QPR) training initiative including logistics, marketing and lessons learned.

Enjoy some photographs from the 2018 initiative.