From community to crisis and back again: using systematic mapping methodology to critically explore conceptualisations of LGBTQ+ suicide prevention in the UK

Although globally it is acknowledged that LGBTQ+ communities face disproportionately high rates of suicidal thoughts and attempts when compared to their heterosexual counterparts, less is known about the suicide prevention needs of LGBTQ+ people. In response, UK suicide prevention policies have suggested that there needs to be tailored, prioritised and culturally appropriate methods of prevention employed. However, what these should, or even could, look like has been left undefined and unguided. To begin to address this, in this research I employed systematic mapping methods, identifying 79 services, groups and organisations providing suicide prevention to LGBTQ+ communities and engaging with 37 practitioner and facilitators for informal reflections on their service provisions in the UK. Reflecting critically on the findings of this, I explore the pathologising problematics and productive potentialities of expanding suicide prevention beyond the conventional disclosure-to-recovery, mental health model that dominates the landscape of suicide prevention both in the UK, and globally. I ultimately argue that the discomforting tension between the problematic and the productive may offer us fertile space to not only consider what LGBTQ+ suicide prevention is, but what all suicide prevention could be.