Are crisis hotlines required to call the police if the caller is threatening suicide?
Will they even if they are not required?
Will/do they call the police for any other reason?
I’m assuming they have Caller ID, almost everyone does now a days (except me) so if I call they will know my real name & number.
In what jurisdiction?
:smack:
I’m in San Francisco.
The website for San Francisco Suicide Prevention doesn’t seem to say (if it does then I’m blind), but I’m also wondering about the national one as well. It’s a moot point now as I’ve decided it’s pointless for me to call, but I’m still curious.
Thanks
*67
I thought the answer was 42. 
Dial *67 before you call someone and it will block your caller ID info on their phone/system.
Depends on the organisation.
My sister volunteers for the Samaritans.
They won’t call the cops or an ambulance unless the caller asks them to.
The Samaritans have a particularly hands-off approach. From what my sister tells me, if you phone the Samaritans having taken an overdose and refuse to allow them to call the police/ambulance, the counsellor will stay on the line with you until you lose consciousness.
They will report bomb threats, and the IRA frequently used to call those in to them- because the calls aren’t traced.
There is another local suicide hotline staffed by trained counsellors, who will call the cops and an ambulance at the drop of a hat, and if they find out the name of the patient’s GP, will call the GP to “update” them on the calls.
I know this because at least once a week I’ll advise a patient to call a hotline if they feel, for whatever reason, that they may harm themself, and they can’t go to a place of safety like an Emergency Room.
The local hotline will then phone me the next day to tell me that the patient called them, and what am I going to do about it.
I then explain I am aware of the situation and we are managing it.
They ask how.
I explain that I can’t tell them because of patient confidentiality and would need the patient to confirm in person that I am authorised to discuss their care with the hotline staff- and it all goes on in circles from there.
IME- staff on Crisis Hotlines work out quite well who is trying to manipulate them for whatever reason, who is genuinely about to kill themselves, and who just needs to chat.
Call them if you are in crisis- it may help, and if you’re considering suicide, it can hardly make the situation worse.
This makes me think. I once considered calling one regarding a concern over someone else (I didn’t, and don’t, need help personally), but nothing happened and their crisis past. I wonder now if I would have ended up in some “suicide watch” database due to some paper pusher seeing my number in the database of callers and failing to realize that I wasn’t calling because I was suicidal. I don’t need that in my life and on my “record”.
I so totally forgot about that. I would never have thought to use it, especially this mourning when I was tempted to call.
Thanks irishgirl. Anyone know about the U.S.