Suicide intervention training draws diverse NCOs

By Lisa R. RhodesApril 24, 2014

Suicide intervention training draws diverse NCOs
1 / 2 Show Caption + Hide Caption – Staff Sgt. Peter Yokel (right), a training developer at Fort Meade's Noncommissioned Officer Academy Detachment, and Sgt. 1st Class Katie Smith, an Advanced Individual Training platoon sergeant at the U.S. Army Signal School Detachment, demonstrate a... (Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL
Suicide intervention training draws diverse NCOs
2 / 2 Show Caption + Hide Caption – Staff Sgt. Peter Yokel (right), a training developer at Fort Meade's Noncommissioned Officer Academy Detachment, and Sgt. 1st Class Katie Smith, an Advanced Individual Training platoon sergeant at the U.S. Army Signal School Detachment, demonstrate a... (Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md (April 2014) -- About a month ago, Sgt. 1st Class Katie Smith ran into a Solider who she had trained in Fort Meade's Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training workshop.

The Soldier told Smith that a few days after she completed the ASIST workshop, she volunteered at a women's shelter and met a client who was at risk for suicide.

Smith recalled that the Soldier intervened and was able to help the woman.

"You could tell how proud she [the Soldier] was. She was confident in the situation," Smith said. "I was so proud of her."

Smith, an Advanced Individual Training platoon sergeant at the U.S. Army Signal School Detachment, was one of two newly trained ASIST trainers to lead an ASIST workshop for 15 service members on April 17 at the Calvary Chapel.

ASIST is a 15-hour workshop that teaches participants to connect, understand and assist people who may be at risk for suicide.

Fort Meade's Army Substance Abuse Program sponsors monthly ASIST workshops as part of its ongoing suicide prevention/intervention efforts.

Smith, along with 22 other NCOs and two DoD civilians, completed a five-day ASIST Training the Trainer (T4T) session last August that was sponsored by ASAP.

As a newly trained ASIST trainer, Smith is required to lead three, two-day ASIST workshops within a year.

Marissa Pena, Fort Meade's Suicide Prevention Program manager, said the new group of ASIST trainers are different from past trainers.

"Historically, over the years, ASIST trainers have been chaplain and chaplain assistants or mental health professionals," Pena said. "These individuals have been a great asset to the Army's suicide prevention programs. However, suicide tends to be a very taboo subject, and many times individuals contemplating suicide may feel, because of the negative stigma, that they can't reach out to chaplains and mental health providers for help."

Pena said that service members may feel that chaplains and mental health providers will "judge them, or get them in trouble with their career."

For the ASIST T4T session in August, ASAP decided to recruit NCOs whose primary job was not of the "typical" chaplain or mental health professional.

The aim was to recruit service members from different military occupation specialties who could support chaplains and mental health providers, Pena said.

"Another reason was because we need as many people as possible in the Department of Defense from all different jobs and military occupational specialties to be trained as caregivers because anyone at anytime can be at risk for suicide," she said.

The NCOs who completed the training range in job occupations, including IT specialists, communications, logistics, and intelligence analysts, and work for various units and organizations on post, including the garrison, the Defense Information School and the National Security Agency.

"We want those 'frontline' workers to be able to help and respond if their battle buddy or co-worker might be at risk for suicide," Pena said.

Staff Sgt. Peter Yokel, a training developer at Fort Meade's Noncommissioned Officer Academy Detachment, also completed the ASIST T4T session last August. He helped to lead the ASIST workshop on April 17.

"They want someone in the trenches -- someone other than mental health professionals to get the training out there to people," said Yokel.

Although he was assigned to complete ASIST T4T, Yokel said he would have signed up for the training on his own.

"It's helping me to bring down the number of people who are hurting, to get down the number of suicides," he said.

Yokel said the T4T training was unlike any other kind of Army training.

"This makes you a combat medic, but for mental health, and it's much more effective," he said. "You work alongside them [the person at risk for suicide]. They connect with you, and you get to help them when they are in need."

Smith said that as a platoon sergeant, she interacts with Soldiers every day.

She said Soldiers who are young and new to the Army often feel isolated and alone and may not be aware that there are service members who can support them when they need help.

"The very fact that I talk to them keeps my door open," Smith said, noting that her training in suicide prevention and intervention is an asset in her job.

"If they didn't have anyone to talk to, they would have been a person at risk."

Pena said the varied job specialties of the NCO trainers enable them to present the ASIST curriculum in a way that their peers can relate to and understand.

As a result, participants who complete the training are spreading the word about ASIST.

"The number of participants who come to our monthly garrison ASIST workshops have doubled," Pena said.

"Participants are leaving the workshop as trained caregivers in suicide first aid, feeling confident and secure in knowing how to aid someone at risk for suicide. At the end of the day, [that's] all that matters," she said.