France is among European Countries with alarmingly high rates of suicide (around

11 000 deaths/year) and suicide attempts (≈ 160 000 /year). Suicide stands particulary high in certain regions and among young people.

In October 2000, the French Federation of Psychiatric Societies (“Fédération Française de Psychiatrie) and the National Health Agency (“Haute Autorité de Santé”) organized a Consensus Conference entitled : “How to detect and manage suicidal crisis”, which was the starting point for lounching a national training Program aimed at physicians and caregivers. Several academics (psychiatrists and psychologists) were trained for each of the French “regions” who, in turn, had to teach and train “first line” caregivers locally, throughout the country.

The aims of the National Program were to 1) increase awareness of the “first line” resource persons and caregivers 2) provide simple pragmatic and immediately usable technical skills to caregivers and 3) use interactive sessions based on role-playing and case-work on real cases.

The Program, as it was developed and organized in Lorraine will be presented