2. About Us

Consultations/Evaluations

Life in Mind aims to connect organisations, programs, researchers and professionals working in suicide prevention in Australia, while supporting a coordinated, consistent national approach to suicide prevention.

The strength of Life in Mind lies in its inclusion of the suicide prevention sector to develop a pivotal connection for organisations, programs, researchers and professionals working in suicide prevention in Australia.

Initial sector consultations

From June–August 2017, 98 participants from 75 suicide prevention-related organisations, plus 32 representatives from 20 Primary Health Networks (PHNs), took part in face-to-face and online consultations.

Overall, the consultations sought to gain information and understanding about:

  • needs and priorities of organisations
  • preferred content for the portal
  • ways to support effective and safe knowledge exchange across sectors (locally, regionally and nationally)
  • existing suicide prevention policies/strategies/frameworks/action plans, research, programs (primary, secondary and postvention approaches), services and resources that are evidence-based and best practice standards for communicating about suicide
  • the Charter, including content review and ways to operationalise it.

The summary report, which details the findings from this consultation process, can be accessed here: Life in Mind consultation summary.

Ongoing formative evaluations

Life in Mind continues to complete a series of evaluations to assess the effectiveness of Life in Mind, particularly in relation to meeting stakeholder content needs and priorities and portal functionality. Outcomes from these evaluations will be used to make continuous improvements to the online portal.

During the most recent January 2020 evaluation 102 Life in Mind users participated in an online survey.

The aims of this evaluation were to:

  • Gain feedback around perceptions of duplication of work within the suicide prevention sector;
  • Gain feedback around feasibility, utility, acceptability and appropriateness, accuracy and content of the current online portal;
  • Gain feedback on current content and identify any gaps;
  • Gain information about awareness and use of the National Communications Charter (The Charter); and
  • Gain information around awareness of the role of the Life in Mind Champions.