Module 3 > Identifying populations at elevated risk in your community
How can you identify populations at elevated risk for suicide in your community specifically? The first step is to understand your community’s demographics overall. State and local governments collect and track a range of demographic data including race, ethnicity, sex, age, and income. Although less common, some communities also gather data on LGBTQ+ populations. Identifying these populations can support more equitable suicide prevention planning.
National data sets, including data collected by the Census Bureau, Bureau of Labor Statistics, and other federal agencies can help to fill in gaps and round out locally available data. For example:
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Explore Census Data generates customized reports at the city or county level including age, income, education, numbers of veterans and foreign-born residents, and other indicators.
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The CPS Table Creator can provide state level summaries of key demographics including age, race, ethnicity, sex, and poverty with the ability to “cross-tab” data to learn how these different demographics intersect with each other.
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The USDA tracks county-level data about rural communities, including information on rural industries.
- COVID-19 Demographic and Economic Resources provides demographic and economic data at the state and county level about populations and industries at elevated risk for COVID-19 and the Household Pulse Survey documents state and county-level impacts of COVID-19 on mental health, food insecurity, employment, housing, and a range of other outcomes.
Reflection Questions
Use one or more of the resources above to explore data available for your community from national data sets.
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Which populations at elevated risk for suicide according to national data are present in your community?
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What are some gaps in available demographic data in your community?
Next lessons in this section
Continue to the next lesson of the "Identifying populations at elevated risk in your community" section of Module 3 to dive deeper into local data in your community:
Tracking suicide data in your community - What local data can you use to inform your prevention work?
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