Premature to say what led to suicides, says expert
Talking to your children about the recent deaths of young people in Cape Breton by suicide is challenging, in ensuring that the tragic events are neither downplayed nor overstated, Dr. Stan Kutcher says.
Kutcher is regarded as an expert in adolescent mental health. He was asked to come to Cape Breton by Health and Wellness Minister Randy Delorey and Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Zach Churchill after several teens in the area died by suicide in the past six months.
Kutcher specializes in youth mental health and suicide, and is co-chair of the minister’s mental health advisory panel.
He arrives on Monday and he will leave Wednesday evening.
Kutcher said in an interview Friday it’s premature to speculate what factors may be linked to the recent incidents in Cape Breton.
“One of the challenges of course is how to talk about suicide in a responsible way, in a way that helps young people understand the issue and doesn’t downplay the seriousness of it but doesn’t upplay the prevalence of it,” he said. “Because suicide is a rare event, sometimes it does happen that we have a cluster that occurs simply by randomness, sometimes there are common factors around a group of young people that dies.”
In having those conversations with young people, presenting rational, calm, factual information is useful, Kutcher added.
“For everything, it’s the best if parents and kids can have a solid, positive, open, respectful relationship, that’s always the wish,” he said.
He will look into mental health needs for young people in the community and determine what initiatives can help address mental health concerns on the island.
Kutcher said he has asked to meet with the families of the young people who recently died by suicide, if the families wish to speak with him. He said he will also speak with representatives of schools, health providers as well as concerned citizens to try to understand what is happening.
Kutcher said it’s difficult to say what sort of impact the prevalence of social media may have on mental health issues facing young people and incidents of suicide.
“We don’t really know,” he said. “There’s a lot of speculation, certainly, about the relationship between social media and death by suicide, for sure. But our big challenge is that the social media landscape that we’re working with is a very new one and it’s hard to tease out cause-effect impact, all that other kind of stuff right now, for sure.”
Kutcher said he’s been asked to submit a brief report about potential steps that could be taken, which he said he will do “as expeditiously as possible.”
“I understand that there is concern in the community and I understand that we need to address that concern appropriately and as quickly as possible,” he said.