Psychiatric hospitalization doesn't prevent suicide, according to the data.

Psychiatric hospitalization isn’t supported by the evidence currently.

Suicide prevention. It’s important. It’s important for veterans. It’s important for youth. It’s important for older people. No one is arguing we need to let suicide run its course.

Despite endless agreement that suicide = bad, we also seem to be focused on evidence everywhere but… here. We know if someone is suicidal… we should do …something!

“What that “something” action should consist of… is not clear.

People often think of psychiatric hospitalization as the something that should be done, and so I figured it’s about time to review the evidence again.

Does psychiatric hospitalization help?

First, we should define help.

I’d argue that “less death by suicide?” is the strongest version of the argument for “is this helpful?" (Spoiler alert: no).

There is a nihilism in the arguments for our coercive system, which are something like the following: “Well, what else are we going to do?!” A lack of alternate options seems to be the argument, and it’s one I’ve heard before. The other argument is…