Uncovering and Identifying the Missing Voices in Suicide Bereavement

Abstract

The field of suicide postvention remains relatively immature in terms of the current knowledge base. This manuscript examines the existing knowledge regarding suicide bereavement and describes the limitations of the suicide bereavement knowledge base using a critical review of the literature specifically relating to suicide bereavement published in the previous 10 years. Six limitations are identified in the literature: concern about samples used in research, sampling only people who have been help-seeking, women being overrepresented in studies, additional design issues including limitations by research ethics boards, definitional problems in who is suicide bereaved, and determining the size of the population bereaved by suicides. This is followed by a discussion of the need to define the suicide bereaved population, as well as understand the effect of suicide bereavement. The paper closes with suggestions for future directions that are required in the field of suicide bereavement in order to best understand and help those people left behind in the wake of suicide deaths.