National Suicide Prevention Leadership Group (NSPLG): fourth annual report

NSPLG Lived Experience Panel (LEP)

Since we established our NSPLG Lived Experience Panel in 2019, it has been supported by SAMH and its full-time LEP Co-Ordinator. The LEP’s remarkable members past and present have influenced, co-designed and co-produced across the range of SPAP actions and our broader work. We have all learned from each other and we consider the NSPLG’s foundational commitment to giving equal weight to evidence by experience and academic evidence as our strongest investment.

In 2021 the World Health Organisation recognised the effectiveness of this approach when it cited our LEP and its working practices as “an internationally significant case study in meaningful participation of people with lived experience in suicide prevention work”^[i].

In September 2022 to mark World Suicide Prevention Day the LEP held a Celebration and Learning Event for members of the NSPLG network and partner organisations, to promote personal and group learning. Individual LEP members generously shared their own backgrounds, their experiences of being part of the Panel and their pride in making change for the better across suicide prevention in Scotland and beyond. Their work will go on to be at the heart of Scotland’s new Suicide Prevention Strategy - Creating Hope Together.

These are some of the views of NSPLG LEP members about their work over the last four years:

"A bunch of "normal" people, brought together by grief and sad times, but who are passionate about making a difference.”.

”Imagine a group of individuals from all walks of life, who have been impacted by suicide in one way or another, meeting once a month on Zoom during a pandemic.....result.....recognised by the World Health Organisation!”

"The word suicide is hard to say and not one any of us want to say. But it has been said many times with the work we've done on the LEP and will continue to be said out of respect to those we've lost.”

“My time on the LEP has been one of the most rewarding of my life. I have been able to make a successful contribution to a program that will make a difference and save people's lives. I have felt valued and appreciated throughout. The LEP has been recognised by the WHO as a best practice and I am so proud to have been a part of it.”

“Sharing my own lived experience and learning from the shared experiences of other courageous individuals from diverse backgrounds, has been a humbling and rewarding experience. As members of the LEP, our experiences have been validated and we have been recognised as experts by experience. By using our unique expertise we have been able to highlight gaps, identify areas for improvement and shape and develop change for the future of suicide prevention in Scotland.”