How can we use technology to attack suicide?

On RallyPoint, we’ve seen people come to the site to ask questions and build connections around all aspects of joining, serving in, transitioning from, and reminiscing about military life. It’s helpful to have so many people here who are knowledgeable, helpful, and eager to offer assistance where they can be useful. Unfortunately, some of our fellow members’ questions come from service members, veterans, family members, caregivers and survivors who are struggling with mental health challenges, especially now more than ever (https://rly.pt/SocialDistance). And this isn’t just a problem caused by all the challenges we are facing in the wake of the coronavirus. It’s been showing a trend in the wrong direction even before anyone in the US had COVID 19 (https://rly.pt/smSuicideSpike).

Nobody has figured out suicide and there’s no better population to serve against this problem than those on RallyPoint. One reason we have the best military on earth is because we have amazing people operating sophisticated technology around the world ready to fight and win America’s wars. But how can we employ technology to attack suicide: the silent enemy that lurks among our warfighters, veterans and families that is often unseen until it has landed its death blow?

RallyPoint has taken the position of being a place for the military community to more easily help each other as individuals on issues ranging from joining the ranks of those in service, to gaining and maintaining readiness, to transitioning and finally allowing those who have left service to pay it forward to those a few steps earlier in the process. Many of our members have faced similar challenges and found a way to fight through them, and are uniquely able to offer support because of their own experiences.

Additionally, members of the RallyPoint team have joined in support by sharing the best resources available when people are asking for help. But how can we improve the way we take care of people who find themselves in these tough situations and decide to share their struggles with our community?

For starters, RallyPoint members have created nearly 6 million public posts about military life so we realized there has to be a better way to make sure that people who are publicly sharing their worries about their mental health are met with the help they seek. What if that struggling member doesn’t tag a post correctly, or they don’t have connections to see that they are sharing signs of suicide risk? This is where we can use technology to alert the community and make reaching out as fast and consistent as possible.

RallyPoint is piloting algorithms that alert the right members of the team to share emergency resources when someone is saying things publicly that indicate they might be at risk of suicide. High priority messages are sent to the RallyPoint team when people use words and phrases in the unique context of expressing worry about self harm. This only happens for posts shared publicly. These posts are made by members who know - and in these cases, desperately hope - that many others who are outside their personal network will see their posts and respond in a helpful manner.

Now for the hardest question: what do we do now? We are working with leading partners in the public and private sectors to figure this out and want your feedback. What are the best programs you’ve seen that you think are leading the way in supporting military mental health? Are there other technologies you like that help people through these troubling issues?

The only way we’re going to successfully mount a successful attack against suicide is if we do it together and we look forward to your input in this journey.