Alliances against Depression–a community based approach to target depression and to prevent suicidal behaviour

Depressive disorders as well as fatal and non-fatal suicidal behaviour continue to be important mental health issues. Because of the close relation between depression and suicidal behaviour, it is likely that preventive actions improving care and optimizing treatment for depressed patients result in a reduction of suicidal acts. This was shown in the Nuremberg Alliance against Depression, a two-year four-level community based intervention program associated with a 24% reduction of suicidal acts (completed and attempted suicides combined) compared to a baseline year and a control region. Serving as a model project, this approach has up to now been adopted in more than 100 regions in Germany and Europe. Within the suicide prevention project OSPI-Europe, the four-level-approach was optimized and further implemented and evaluated in different European regions.