Completed Projects

PRiSMM- Preventing Suicide in Michigan Men (2020-2025)

Preventing Suicide in Michigan Men (PRiSMM) is a comprehensive, multi-component collaboration designed to reduce the state’s suicide morbidity and mortality rates by 10% over five years. With a specific focus on adult men, who represent 67% of the over 1500 suicide deaths annually in Michigan, PRiSMM will be led by the state’s Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) Injury and Violence Prevention Section, with strong collaboration from the University of Michigan’s Injury Research Center; the University of Maryland, Baltimore’s Man Therapy Michigan team; Central Michigan University’s School of Medicine’s Interdisciplinary Center for Community Health & Wellness; Henry Ford Health System; Michigan Department of Corrections; Michigan Department of Military and Veterans Affairs; and others. PRiSMM will develop, implement, and rigorously evaluate a comprehensive public health approach to suicide prevention, with a focus on reducing suicidal behaviors and suicide deaths among men ages 25 years and older. The program will also conduct a careful analysis of Michigan’s current prevention capacity and identify the gaps in our state’s suicide prevention safety net in order to move sustainable and effective efforts forward beyond the life of this funding opportunity. 

Project Goals include: 

1. Establishment of data-driven decision-making processes that identifies vulnerable subpopulations of adult men and characterizes relevant risk and protective factors for those groups in our state. 

2. Development of a strategic action plan targeting adult men in Michigan that capitalizes on existing prevention capacity and utilizes guidance from the CDC’s Resource for Action of suicide prevention policies, programs, and practices. This action plan will contain: 

1. Tier 1 Community Level Interventions: community-based implementation of firearm safe storage and lethal means counseling interventions; increasing protective environments through organizational policy and culture change in Michigan’s Department of Corrections; safe and effective community messaging regarding high risk populations; strategically targeted gatekeeper training; and Man Therapy Michigan, a public health campaign and online intervention designed to promote men’s mental health and wellbeing, with a focus on suicide prevention, among working-aged men living in Michigan

2. Tier 2 Health Care System Interventions: strengthen delivery and access to care via systems change through a Suicide Prevention Quality Improvement Collaborative led by Henry Ford Health System’s Zero Suicide leaders, focused on continuity of care; identify and support people at risk through provider education (AMSR)

3. Tier 3 Upstream interventions: strengthening access and delivery of care through telemental health

3. Rigorous evaluation of each aspect of the model as well as overall impact of prevention strategies on state suicide morbidity and mortality and continuous quality improvement based on data review. 

4. Communication of findings to key stakeholders. 

UM Principle Investigator and Lead Evaluator: Cynthia Ewell Foster 

News articles, products, and recent PRiSMM presentations and publications:

• Smith, K., Dawdy, D., Magness, C., Smith, T., Johnson, G., Dubaisi, S., & Ewell Foster, C. (2026). Perceptions of Assessing and Managing Suicide Risk (AMSR) Training Among Clinicians in Correctional Settings. Corrections, 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/23774657.2026.2626585

• Funk, C., Magness, C., Smith, T., Portual, J., Cao, S., Nair, P., Smith, K., Ewell Foster, C. (2024).  Suicide Prevention Parctices Following Counseling on Access to Lethal Means Training.  Poster presented at the National Conference on Firearm Related Harms, Seattle, Washington, December 9-11, 2024.