The Foundation is very pleased to announce that we have been successful in obtaining a generous grant for the establishment in the area of a StandBy Response Program. The grant of $375,000 from the Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Programs Branch of the Department of Health and Ageing was awarded in response to a detailed submission for funding provided by the Foundation, in partnership with United Synergies Ltd.
The StandBy Response Service is an active postvention program that provides a 24-hour coordinated response to address the needs of families, friends and acquaintances who have been bereaved through suicide. The service was initially titled the StandBy Suicide Bereavement Response Service when it was established in March 2002 under the auspices of Noosa Youth Service Inc.
StandBy’s parent organisation is now United Synergies Ltd, a not-for-profit company whose services support young people, families and communities around Australia. United Synergies Ltd evolved from the former Noosa Youth Service which began running high quality programs for young people on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast in 1989.
The StandBy model is a community-based support and intervention service for people bereaved through suicide. It aims to reduce potential adverse health outcomes and assist in further addressing suicide for bereaved family, friends and associates. By encouraging active participation in a wide range of existing networks and peak regional bodies as well as agencies such as police, ambulance, courts, community groups and health services, the program greatly reduces the difficulties experienced by bereaved people in accessing support.
Now that funding has been determined, the planning can start for the establishment of the service in the Cairns area. A StandBy coordinator will be appointed to oversee the project, and a team of counsellors will be established for a twenty four hour, seven days a week service for the bereaved. An integral component of the program, they provide timely, sensitive and essential support on a request basis. The interventions occur at a site nominated by clients in collaboration with the Program Coordinator and the initial referral agency.
The StandBy Response program will be adapted and tailored to the requirements and capacities of the Cairns community. This involves ensuring the implementation of the program is culturally appropriate, particularly in relation to Indigenous culture and in consideration of the complexities of the bereavement process following suicide.
The establishment of the StandBy Response Program is
a very welcome addition to the work already being undertaken by the FNQ Suicide
Prevention Taskforce, and will add greatly to the provision of services to
vulnerable people in our society.
Cap. New Director of the Foundation, Bob Owen, Dulcie Bird, Professor Peter Bycroft from Corporate Diagnostics and Sue Scheinpflug, United Synergies CEO.