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Telephone crisis services are increasingly subject to a requirement to “prove their worth” as a suicide prevention strategy. The purpose of this paper is to: first, provide a detailed overview of the evidence on the impact of telephone crisis services on suicidal users; second, determine the limitations of the outcome measures used in this evidence; and third, suggest directions for future research.

MEDLINE via Pubmed (from 1966), PsycINFO APA (from 1967) and ProQuest Dissertation and Theses (all to 4 June 2015) were searched. Papers were systematically extracted by title then abstract according to predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria.

In total, 18 articles met inclusion criteria representing a range of outcome measures: changes during calls, reutilization of service, compliance with advice, caller satisfaction and counsellor satisfaction. The majority of studies showed beneficial impact on an immediate and intermediate degree of suicidal urgency, depressive mental states as well as positive feedback from users and counsellors.

A major limitation pertains to differences in the use of the term “suicidal”. Other limitations include the lack of long-term follow-up and of controlled research designs. Future research should include a focus on long-term follow-up designs, involving strict data protection. Furthermore, more qualitative research is needed in order to capture the essential nature of the intervention.

This paper attempts to broaden the study and the concept of “effectiveness” as hitherto used in the literature about telephone crisis services and offers suggestions for future research.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the social value food rescue enterprises can create for both their stakeholders and the wider community “in the meantime” whilst longer term solutions to the problems of insecurity and waste are sought.

FoodShare, a New Zealand urban-based social enterprise specialising in food redistribution, served as a case study for this research. Semi-structured interviews (n=13) were conducted with FoodShare staff and key stakeholder groups (food donors, financial donors, recipient agencies and volunteers). In addition, an anonymous online survey (n=40) was completed by the wider organisational volunteer network. The interview guides were structured around a new social value evaluation tool, Social Return on Investment, which is increasingly used to demonstrate the impact of such programmes. Deductive methods were used to code the resulting transcripts to identify key outcomes experienced by FoodShare’s stakeholders.

The outcomes of FoodShare’s work differed for the various stakeholders. For food donors, outcomes included “more involved relationships with community”, and “improved perceptions of corporate social responsibility”. Identified key outcomes for the financial donors included “key promotional opportunity” and “do something good”. For recipient agencies, important outcomes were “greater volume of food” and “increased reach”. Volunteers reported “meeting new people”, “a sense of accomplishment in helping others” and “learning new skills”. There were also a number of nutritional and environmental outcomes for the wider community.

Given the dearth of evidence on the societal value that is created in redistributing unsold food to people in need, this novel perspective makes a significant contribution to the literature in this area.

Briefly reviews previous literature by the author before presenting an original 12 step system integration protocol designed to ensure the success of companies or countries in their efforts to develop and market new products. Looks at the issues from different strategic levels such as corporate, international, military and economic. Presents 31 case studies, including the success of Japan in microchips to the failure of Xerox to sell its invention of the Alto personal computer 3 years before Apple: from the success in DNA and Superconductor research to the success of Sunbeam in inventing and marketing food processors: and from the daring invention and production of atomic energy for survival to the successes of sewing machine inventor Howe in co‐operating on patents to compete in markets. Includes 306 questions and answers in order to qualify concepts introduced.

Little is known about the gender profile of callers to crisis hotlines, despite distinct gender differences in suicide risk and behavior. The authors assessed current knowledge of the role of caller gender in the use of crisis hotlines for suicide, specifically whether there are differences in frequency, reason for call and caller outcomes by gender.

The authors conducted a scoping literature review of peer-reviewed studies published since 2000 in Medline, PubMed and PsychInfo, examining a total of 18 articles based on 16 studies.

Overall, women represent a higher percentage of calls to crisis hotlines worldwide, despite men having higher rates of suicide. Primary reasons for calling hotlines were the same for men and women, regardless of geography or culture. When gender differences in reason for call were reported, they were consistent with literature documenting gender differences in the prevalence of risk factors for suicide, including higher rates of substance use among men and higher instances of domestic violence/abuse among women.

There was variability in the studies the authors examined. This review was limited to research on crisis telephone hotlines and did not include text or chat services. Due to data reporting, the findings are constrained to reporting on a male/female gender binary.

Findings on gender differences in crisis line use suggest a need for continued research in this area to determine how to best meet the needs of callers of all genders.

Looks at the 2000 Employment Research Unit Annual Conference held at the University of Cardiff in Wales on 6/7 September 2000. Spotlights the 76 or so presentations within and shows that these are in many, differing, areas across management research from: retail finance; precarious jobs and decisions; methodological lessons from feminism; call centre experience and disability discrimination. These and all points east and west are covered and laid out in a simple, abstract style, including, where applicable, references, endnotes and bibliography in an easy‐to‐follow manner. Summarizes each paper and also gives conclusions where needed, in a comfortable modern format.

The major purpose of this paper is the review of the administration and operation of four on‐scene victim assistance units within law enforcement agencies in one Canadian and three US cities. The primary purpose is to learn how these units operate and the extent to which there are accepted by the officers involved. An additional purpose is learn how many departments nationally had such units.

The basic methodology includes telephone interviews with key personnel in each unit, an on‐site examination of the Denver, Colorado unit, and a brief survey of large city police departments to learn the extent of on‐scene units in major US cities.

A review of the administration and operation of each unit reveals that each unit is well managed, integrated into the department's structure, and staffed with paid staff who are members of the department and volunteers. Key to the success of each unit is extensive training of victim specialists and a clear understanding between specialists and police that the officers at the scene are in charge. The findings clearly confirm that such units are well received by officers at all levels. The survey findings indicate that relatively few departments have on‐scene victim assistance units, although most do have some program to address victims' issues.

While there is an extensive literature on victim assistance generally, little has been written about the need for, and operation of, on‐scene victim assistance units that are part of police departments. This article contributes to knowledge in this area and suggests that such units can be a valuable asset to departments.

The adoption of telephone-delivered mental health services (TDMHS) for scaling collaborative care or addressing access to mental health services in routine primary care practice is gradual despite the needs of the population. Although there are multi-level factors associated with efficient implementation of collaborative care, there is limited understanding of clinicians’ perceptions, experiences and acceptability providing mental health treatment exclusively over the telephone. The purpose of this paper is to explore behavioral health clinicians’ delivery of mental health services over the telephone within primary care settings.

This qualitative study explored behavioral health professionals’ perceptions and experiences providing remote, TDMHS. Convenience sampling was used to recruit 11 clinicians in New York, California and Arizona who provided collaborative care services to patients exclusively over the telephone. Semi-structured interviews were conducted, and analyzed using qualitative content analysis methods.

Three main themes and associated subthemes emerged from the analyses. The first theme was participants’ perceptions of TDMHS prior to implementation relating to patient characteristics, patient engagement and comparison to in-person therapy. The second main theme identified was participants’ experiences implementing TDMHS with subthemes relating to benefits, quality of care, gaps in care and concerns implementing TDMHS. The final theme that emerged from the analysis was participants’ perceived acceptability of TDMHS by patients.

The small sample size limits the generalizability of these findings.

Mental health services delivered over the telephone are perceived as feasible and acceptable by behavioral health clinicians.

This study contributes to gaps in research about behavioral health clinicians’ beliefs, uptake and acceptability toward mental health services delivered exclusively over the telephone.