QPR Institutional Suicide Risk Reduction Program

Cost, Savings and Potential Revenue

Our approach to assisting organizations create a climate of patient safety and reduce exposure to suicide malpractice at reasonable cost is to provide them with the training and tools they need to install and manage a suicide risk reduction program within current budget constraints. By providing a variety of self-study Instructor Guides, online courses, and distance learning technologies, we are able to provide agencies and institutions comprehensive program installation and quality improvement products at reasonable cost. By providing 24/7 access to our web based training programs, continuing costs of staff training are minimized. For a benefit summary of our blended, web-based distance learning programs click here.

Overall, our training programs and protocols can save time and money through:

• Better decision-making. Standardization of suicide risk data collection at intake and in emergency evaluation settings improves triage decision-making and helps match and justify level of risk with level of care.
• Better documentation of suicide risk and clinical decision making, both of which reduce exposure to malpractice. The QPR Institute is the winner of the J.J. Negley Associates 1998 Presidents Award for Avoiding Suicide Malpractice.
• Reduced external training costs. Your qualified clinical trainers teach our programs to your staff, and/or your staff completes our training via our online training service.
• Reduced frequency of sentinel events and costs associated with root cause analyses for non-fatal and fatal suicidal behaviors. The current estimated cost of a single root cause analysis in staff time, lost productivity and revenue is $9,700 (source: Medical Risk Management Associates, 1999).

Also, consider the following sources of lost productivity:

• Employee down time dealing with the immediate situation: 4-8 hrs
• Supervisory time (support, investigation, debriefing, rumor control, etc.): 4-6 hrs
• Incident report writing/chart review: 1-2 hrs
• Family support services: 2-4 hrs
• Executive report to funding authority where required: 1 hr
• Direct staff time for Q-I review: 15-20 hrs (7 for death reviewers/8-10 staff at one hour Q-I review meeting)
• Increased malpractice premiums (unknown)
• Staff stress and absenteeism (varies)
• Reduced caseload capacity due to system disruption (varies)
• EAP usage by affected staff: 4-6 hrs
• Legal consultation (varies)
• Extended staff leave (depends on exposure to suicide, e.g., finding body)
• Potential public relations costs if suicide is high profile and/or involves a homicide, or makes media news
• Replacement costs of any staff who leave because of incident

Your staff are licensed to train 3rd parties in your area where fees generated may be used to offset program installation costs and create new revenue