Development of a Suicide Prevention Life Gatekeeper Training Program in China: A Delphi study

Introduction Youth suicide has been a pressing public mental health concern in China, yet there is a lack of localised gatekeeper intervention programs developed for Chinese schools. Life Gatekeeper was the first systematically developed gatekeeper program which aimed to equip teachers and parents with knowledge, skills, and ability to identify and intervene students at high risk of suicide. This study aimed to achieve expert consensus on the content of this program. Methods The Delphi method was used to elicit consensus on statements essential to include in the training program. In the form of scoring existing statements and responding to open-ended questions, experts have the opportunity to evaluate the content, delivery form, feasibility, and overall feeling of the initial training program. Two Delphi rounds were conducted among Chinese panel members with diversified professional backgrounds in suicide research and practice. Statements were accepted for inclusion in the adjusted training program if they were endorsed by at least 80% of the panel. Results Consensus was achieved on 201 statements out of 207 statements for inclusion in the adapted guidelines for the gatekeeper programme, with 151 from the original questionnaire, and 50 generated from the comments of the panel members. These endorsed statements were used to develop the Life Gatekeeper training program. Conclusion This Delphi study provided an evidence base in developing of the first gatekeeper training program in China. We hope that the current study could pave the way for more evidence based suicide prevention programs in China. Further study is warranted to evaluate the effectiveness of the Life Gatekeeper training program. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement Research Fund of Vanke School of Public Health (100009001) ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable. Yes All data produced in the present study are available upon reasonable request to the authors