People in Cuyahoga County whose loved ones die by suicide will soon have a new group to lean on in the aftermath.
NAMI Greater Cleveland – a mental health advocacy and support organization – will launch its Local Outreach to Suicide Survivors (LOSS) Team this July. The suicide response team will provide in-person comfort and resources to family and friends within 48 hours of a suicide.
The nonprofit will create the team using an $82,000 grant from the Alcohol, Drug Addiction and Mental Health Board of Cuyahoga County. It will work closely with the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office, which responds to suicides.
People who know someone who died by suicide are more likely to have suicidal thoughts and to make a suicide attempt themselves, said Katie Jenkins, the executive director of NAMI Greater Cleveland. Many feel a sense of guilt after the suicide occurs, said Brittani Handel, a medical legal death investigator at the Medical Examiner’s Office.
“This would be a long-term support to help realize that it’s not your fault and avoid that loneliness feeling,” Handel said.
The LOSS Team will typically include two trained volunteers, with at least one who has experienced suicide loss in their own lives, who can act as peers to grieving individuals. The volunteers will discuss mental health resources such as therapy as well as provide a simple human connection.
“Support is also going to be just sitting with them. Being present. Having empathy,” Jenkins said. “Giving them space to process and talk through whatever feelings they may be having at that moment.”
Cuyahoga County saw about 220 suicide deaths in 2024, up from about 200 in 2023.
The LOSS team will use an evidence-based model that more than 30 other Ohio counties have adopted. Handel and Christina Sharkin, both medical legal death investigators, learned about the program at a conference last year and wanted to set one up in Cuyahoga County. When a person dies unexpectedly, they respond to the scene to help piece together how it occurred.
Sharkin said this can include asking family and friends difficult questions about their loved ones, including deaths they suspect were suicides. She wants those community members to have more emotional support after her team leaves.
“There’s, like, faces that stick in your mind, you know, when you’ve driven away from that scene and you’ve left them there,” Sharkin said. “Feeling kind of helpless that there’s not anything more to offer to give them more help. Especially mothers and fathers, families that have lost loved ones.”
Sharkin said that she would like to dispatch the LOSS Team to respond on-site at about the same time as medical legal death investigators. But Jenkins said the LOSS Team may also reach survivors by phone after the Medical Examiner’s Office responds and set up a meeting in a setting they prefer – at home, in a hospital or in a community setting.
After initially connecting with a family, Jenkins said the LOSS team will attempt to stay in touch for up to a year afterward. She would like team members to provide support or outreach especially on the anniversary of the suicide or “firsts” – like the first birthday or holiday without the loved one present.
In addition to the suicide response team, NAMI Greater Cleveland also launched a Survivor of Suicide Loss Support Group in April. It meets the first and third Thursday of every month from 6:30-7 p.m. at the Lutheran Church of Covenant at 19000 Libby Road, Maple Heights.
Jenkins said NAMI Greater Cleveland has already seen significant interest in the group – despite just a few meetings being held so far.
“Typically, our support groups, we can have one or two and have nobody show up the first couple,” Jenkins said. “Four people came to the first one.”