Q/A Session April 2025: Engaging a member in Safety Planning

Name: SafeSide Prevention
Price range: $

Questions & Responses

How Safety Planning fits within the SafeSide Framework

While safety planning appears as a specific step within the Respond task of the SafeSide Framework, meaningful safety planning actually begins from your first interaction with a member.

The connection you establish, the way you ask about suicide, and how you validate their experience all contribute to effective safety planning. Every conversation about suicide risk naturally builds toward creating a plan that will work for that person.

Key Takeaway:

Safety planning isn't just something you do; it's a process that is woven into how you approach the entire interaction.

Connect

Safety planning begins with establishing a genuine connection with the person. This foundation of rapport allows for more open and honest discussions about difficult topics.

Assess

This assessment is about gathering information that leads to meaningful, person-specific planning.
By listening to understand the person's unique experience, strengths, and context, we gain valuable insights that inform a member-centred safety plan.
Listening for strengths and protective factors that can lead to available resources.
Identifying foreseeable changes supports concrete contingency planning for future events.

Respond

These plans are developed collaboratively, incorporating person-specific strategies and steps based on information learned during the assessment.
Formalising safety plans with the person, in writing, including contingency plans, consolidates the process and should be given to them, their supports (where appropriate), and documented in the member’s health record.

Extend

Safety planning extends beyond the immediate session by identifying key supports and clear roles for those involved in supporting the person when they need it.
Each safety plan becomes part of ongoing care, with regular reviews and updates as circumstances change.

When and how can you initiate safety planning conversations?

Key Takeaway: Assessment aims to drive member-centred planning, asking about foreseeable changes creates a natural transition to safety planning.

When to do it:

Once you have worked through your assessment, asking about foreseeable changes is an ideal time to socialise safety planning.
Explain that you are asking about foreseeable changes to start the planning process..
- “As part of our plan, I’d like to think about a couple of situations that, if they were to happen, would make things a lot worse for you so that we can make a plan to help you feel prepared and supported.”
Normalise collaboration and ownership
- "Think of this as developing a personal guide for tough times. We’ll choose strategies that feel right for you — what matters most is that they are steps you feel confident using."

How to meaningfully engage the person in co-creating the plan?

Key Takeaway: When someone is in crisis or distress, having a plan ready to go can make it easier to follow.

When working with a member, focus on targeted, real-world action plans they can use, not long lists they won’t use.

Build on what you’ve learned when stepping through the SafeSide Framework, incorporate available resources, and consider foreseeable changes and potential supports.

Safety Planning Tips:

Collaborate actively: “Let’s come up with some ideas together about steps you can take, if things get worse again.”
Think about the “What” and the “How”: This means asking the person to imagine real situations where they might use the plan and describe how they’d respond. It helps create a plan with “behavioural meat on the bones” instead of abstract ideas.
Keep it manageable: Focus on 3–5 concrete actions rather than a long list. Example: "Run for 20 minutes at Anytime Fitness" instead of "exercise," or "Call Mum or text Joe" instead of "contact someone."
Use personal language: Use their preferred wording, such as “Plan for tough moments” or “Plan if I get overwhelmed.”
Encourage ownership: “This is your plan… Could you fill in the worksheet while we discuss it?”
Set the expectation early that plans are living documents: “It’s not about making it perfect now — it’s about having a few things that feel doable, and we can build on it together.”
Confidence check: “On a scale of 1–5, how confident are you that you would use this plan if you needed to?”
- If low, collaborate: “What would make it more usable for you?”

When is it appropriate to review or revise the plan, especially in ongoing support contexts?

Key Takeaway: Safety plans should be reviewed and updated regularly, especially when changes occur. This includes foreseeable changes, changes in symptoms or suffering, or changes in care.

The safety plan should be reviewed regularly during care.

Acute phase: Review every session after an initial presentation or if a person has returned with suicidal distress.
Ongoing care: Reviews based on clinical need, and should consider:
- Changes in symptoms, suffering, or recent changes
- New or changed stressors/precipitants
- A foreseeable change has occurred, or new foreseeable changes need to be planned for
- Risk status or state has changed.
Discharge from care: Safety plans should be reviewed before care transitions and consider changes in available resources, means safety and support.
In line with organisational policy, using clinical judgment: Conduct more frequent reviews if suicide ideation continues.

Steps to Conducting a Safety Plan Review

Start the conversation
- "I'd like to check in about how your safety plan is working."
Ask specific questions
- "When was the last time you looked at your plan?"
- "Where do you keep it?"
Ask about usage
- When was the last time you used your plan?
  Where do you keep it?
- Listen for specific examples of when and how strategies were implemented.
Explore effectiveness
- "Tell me about a time you used it. How did it help?"
Identify parts to improve
- What parts helped the most?
- What didn’t work as well?
Update collaboratively
- "Let’s adjust it to make it even more useful for you."
- Document updates.
- Support the person in making the changes wherever they store their safety plans.
Review again when to use the plan.

Key Questions Raised in the Discussion

How do you introduce safety planning when a person is hesitant or skeptical?

Normalise the process: Explain that it’s a preparation tool, not a sign of immediate crisis.
Lower the stakes: Frame it as a brainstorm rather than a formal plan, making it approachable and low-pressure.
Acknowledge past experiences: Recognise that previous safety plans may have felt like tick-box exercises or have been unhelpful.
Reassure flexibility: Emphasise that the plan will evolve and is not "set in stone."
Focus on their values and past strategies: Highlight their existing strengths and past coping strategies — “What has helped before?”

How can you review the safety plan in a natural and non-bureaucratic way?

Make the review feel like part of the person’s story, not like revisiting a static document.

Integrate into conversation: Don’t make it feel like a formal review. If someone mentions a person or strategy from their plan, reflect on it naturally. “Oh, you mentioned visiting your sister. Wasn’t she one of your key supports on your plan?”
Frame as commitment: Instead of "reviewing," say, "I want to keep my promise to check how this plan works for you."
Ask step-based review questions: “Any time you tried step one recently?” and “How did it work?
Highlight success: If the person has naturally used part of the plan without thinking about it, acknowledge this as a win and note it in the plan.

How can clinicians manage the tension between policy demands, clinical documentation, and genuine connection?

Remember, the ultimate goal is a plan that works for the person, not one that just satisfies documentation rules.

Use templates strategically: Use templates with pre-prepared helplines and other details, allowing more time for meaningful conversation.
Explain the purpose of documentation: Be transparent with the person about why certain information needs to be recorded.
Balance structure with flexibility: Follow policy for essential elements, but personalise the interaction so it feels human rather than procedural.

How can families and key supports be integrated into safety planning and reviews?

Involve them early: Identify and include family or key supports when building the plan.
Gain consent and set roles: Clarify the family member’s role in the plan and get the person’s agreement.
Educate supports: Ensure they understand how the plan works and their role when steps are activated.

Additional Resources