Jerome Motto (October 16, 1921 – January 4, 2015) was an American psychiatrist who conducted the first suicide prevention intervention that reduced deaths by suicide, as proven through a randomized controlled trial.[1] The study involved mailing short letters that expressed the researchers' interest in the recipients without pressuring them to take any action.

Motto's approach is sometimes called the "Caring Letters" model of suicide prevention.[2][3] The approach, which was partly inspired by Motto's experience of receiving letters during World War II from a young woman he had met before being deployed,[1] sent a letter from a researcher who had spoken at length with the recipient during a suicidal crisis.[3] The typewritten form letters were brief – sometimes as little as two sentences – personally signed by the researcher, and expressed interest in the recipient without making any demands.[3] They were sent monthly at the beginning, and eventually decreased to quarterly letters; if the recipient wrote back, then an additional personal letter was mailed.[3] Although the exact mechanisms can be debated, researchers generally think that they communicate a genuine interest and social connection that the recipients find helpful.[3]

Caring letters is inexpensive and either the only,[3] or one of very few,[2] approaches to suicide prevention that has been scientifically proven to work during the first years after a suicide attempt that resulted hospitalization.

Jerome Motto died on January 4, 2015, at Mills Peninsula Hospital in Burlingame, California.[4]

Publications

  • Motto, J. A. (1976). "Suicide prevention for high-risk persons who refuse treatment". Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior. 6 (4): 223–230. ISSN 0363-0234. PMID 1023455.

References

  1. 1 2 Cherkis, Jason (November 15, 2018). "The Best Way To Save People From Suicide". The Huffington Post. Retrieved November 29, 2018.
  2. 1 2 Luxton, David D.; Thomas, Elissa K.; Chipps, Joan; Relova, Rona M.; Brown, Daphne; McLay, Robert; Lee, Tina T.; Nakama, Helenna; Smolenski, Derek J. (March 2014). "Caring letters for suicide prevention: implementation of a multi-site randomized clinical trial in the U.S. military and Veteran Affairs healthcare systems". Contemporary Clinical Trials. 37 (2): 252–260. doi:10.1016/j.cct.2014.01.007. ISSN 1559-2030. PMID 24473106.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Nock, Matthew K. (May 8, 2014). The Oxford Handbook of Suicide and Self-Injury. Oxford University Press. p. 375. ISBN 9780190209148.
  4. ↑ "Dr. Jerome A. Motto". San Francisco Chronicle. April 26, 2015. Retrieved December 24, 2019 – via PressReader.
  • Research summary at Stanford University's SPARQ (Social Psychological Answers to Real-world Questions)
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