We know a number of communities and coalitions are engaged in a variety of postvention activities and strategies as part of your comprehensive efforts to address suicide.  To help inform our planning, we would like to gain a better understanding of those efforts.

We would like to invite you to spend a few minutes responding to the questionnaire (https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/postventionNYS) as a means to begin inventorying postvention efforts around the state.

Using the information collected in the survey as well as expert guidance from stakeholders and partners across the state, the workgroup is seeking to accomplish the following:

• Identify effective strategies to assist NYS communities increase their capacity to promote healing and safety in the event of a loss by suicide
   
• Draft a comprehensive, statewide postvention framework that provides guidance for communities when developing or expanding their postvention plans while allowing for flexibility to address unique local elements
   
• Develop a compendium of tools and best practices for communities and agencies to use to meet postvention needs
   
• Articulate a process for developing effective community postvention teams 
   
• Identify gaps in knowledge and research in relation to postvention planning 
   
• Identify opportunities for technical assistance for postvention planning

As we move forward with this agenda, we must ensure that our work will be relevant and helpful to you. Therefore, please take a few moments to respond this questionnaire by November 7, 2014. We look forward to hearing from you. Please feel free to forward this message to other organizations.

Thank you in advance for your time.

[1] Postvention can be defined as "activities developed by, with or for suicide survivors, in order to facilitate recovery after suicide and to prevent adverse outcomes including suicidal behavior" Andriessen K., Can postvention be postvention? Crisis. 2009;30:43-47