Please join us for the latest in our Elevating Voices for Long-Lasting Change town hall series, “Preventing Suicide in Native American Communities,” at 3pm ET, April 27, on Facebook at facebook.com/afspnational.

Those in Native and Indigenous Peoples communities face specific challenges when it comes to mental health and suicide prevention. American Indians and Alaska Natives accounted for the highest suicide rate reported for 2021 (the most recent year reported on by the CDC), with a slight increase for Native American and Alaskan Native males from the previous year.

AFSP’s Senior Vice President of Research, Dr. Jill Harkavy-Friedman, will moderate a discussion with three leading experts on mental health in Native American communities:

• Shelby Rowe is the Executive Director of the Suicide Prevention Resource Center (SPRC) at the OU Health Science Center and a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation. A public health professional, crisis intervention expert, and suicide attempt survivor, Ms. Rowe has been a leader in the suicide prevention movement at the local, state and national level since 2007. In 2016, she was named the Chickasaw Nation Dynamic Woman of the Year.
• Andrea Wiglesworth, M.A, is a member of the Seneca-Cayuga Nation (Deer Clan) and a fourth year graduate student in the University of Minnesota’s Clinical Science and Psychopathology Research Ph.D. program. She is an AFSP research grantee ("A Mixed-method Study of Fluctuations in Suicide Risk and Resilience in Native American Young Adults”) interested in the relationship between forms of stress (e.g. minority stress in Native American populations) and suicidal thoughts and behaviors in childhood and adolescence.
• Rochelle Williams, M.S., is the Tribal Program Manager for Volunteers of America Western Washington (VOAWW), which is the home of the Native and Strong Lifeline (Tribal 988), the first tribal 988 call center, and the Washington Indian Behavioral Health Hub in Everett, Washington. Rochelle is an enrolled member of the Ehattesaht First Nation, which is located on the West side of Northern Vancouver Island, Canada.

The discussion will examine the unique considerations involved in suicide prevention in Native American and Alaskan Native communities, with a focus on what the research tells us; best approaches and necessary adaptations in suicide prevention work for this population; and the use of 988 and crisis response in Native American communities.

We hope you’ll join us for this important and thought-provoking discussion.