Living Hope and its Pivotal Third Year

Author: Living Hope Project Team

Living Hope: A Community Plan to Prevent Suicide in Edmonton is the city’s collective response to suicide and a reflection of our combined determination to translate intention into action. Since its launch in 2018, its partner organizations and community stakeholders have worked together to enhance access to protective factors that decrease the risk of suicide. Now in its final year, three key areas of focus have been identified to carry the plan to a fulsome realization of its core goals. These include: maintaining stakeholder engagement, strengthening connection with local Indigenous communities, and broadening the reach of its sponsored suicide prevention training.

Fundamental to Living Hope’s implementation is strong collaboration with community stakeholders. This group, represented by agencies, organizations, and community members with lived-experience has collectively contributed the resources, experience, and expert knowledge necessary for the plan to progress. Though essential, sustaining such diverse relationships poses its own set of challenges, particularly with the unprecedented arrival of COVID-19, the accompanying health regulations restricting in-person contact in 2019, and the necessary reallocation of resources and personnel by its partners to adapt services to respond to this health crisis. Starting in 2019, Living Hope and its partners began adapting its implementation strategy from in-person to what is now almost entirely virtual. With the continued support of dedicated partners, Living Hope enters into its third year with renewed conviction to maintain and grow its stakeholder engagement central to its suicide prevention efforts. 

Another key aspect for Living Hope’s implementation has been connecting and learning from Edmonton's “at risk” populations. For the plan, at risk is defined not by any inherent characteristic, but by the underlying risk factors that may be experienced by each group which include First Responders, middle aged men, 2SLGBTQ+, and Indigenous communities. To date, collaboration with these unique populations has been a rich and rewarding journey of exploration and learning, though it has required flexible levels of engagement respectful of the capacity of its membership. For the plan and its Indigenous partners, year three represents a timely opportunity to honour and build upon past learnings, while further focusing on strengthening partnerships and forging new understandings over its remaining months.

The final area of focus for the plan’s remaining year of implementation is to continue to broaden and deepen community availability to its sponsored suicide prevention training. This will include digital promotion opportunities through its quarterly newsletter, links on both the 11ofUs.ca and Livinghopeplan.ca websites, and active promotion through the plan’s committee members and community partners.