USU Center for Deployment Psychology Awarded Top Prize for Virtual Suicide Prevention Learning Tool

USU's CDP earns the Gold Medal at the 2023 International Serious Play Conference for its immersive virtual suicide prevention training for behavioral health providers.

July 30, 2024 by Maegan M. Paxton Willing, Ph.D., MPH

The Center for Deployment Psychology (CDP) at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU) was awarded the Gold Medal for Healthcare Games at the recent International Serious Play Awards in Toronto, Canada. The Serious Play Conference offers an opportunity for researchers, educators, and game developers to grow their skills in game-based learning.

Drs. Kevin Holloway and Maegan Paxton Willing accepted the gold medal for the Second Life Island for Preventing Suicide, or SLIPS, on behalf of the CDP. Holloway is the director of Online Training, Technology, and Telehealth at the CDP and an assistant professor in the Medical and Clinical Psychology department. Paxton Willing, assistant professor in the Medical and Clinical Psychology department, is a research psychologist at the CDP, as well as a USU alumna. Both Holloway and Paxton Willing are Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine employees working in support of USU.

SLIPS is a virtual environment that provides behavioral health providers with a unique opportunity to extend their learning from CDP's two-day training workshop in suicide prevention. SLIPS is an interactive, experiential learning experience where providers can practice their suicide prevention skills (risk assessment, safety planning, means safety, and relapse prevention) with simulated patients while receiving asynchronous consultation from our experts in suicide prevention. The SLIPS Firing Range provides an overview of firearm safety and strategies for securing firearms.

"The team worked really hard to create a unique learning environment that allows providers to practice their clinical skills without fear of making mistakes," says Paxton Willing. "As learners go through the Island, they also receive asynchronous consultation from our experts in suicide prevention. This allows the learners to practice or refresh their skills and get feedback from subject matter experts whenever they feel it would be helpful."

"We're so pleased to be involved in such innovative and important work," Holloway says. "Virtual experiential learning can effect real world skills competence in a way that didactic learning can't, and it's such important work to address suicide prevention in our nation's warfighters."

SLIPS joins CDP's other virtual worlds available in Second Life, a commercially-available platform providing a virtual, avatar-based environment. CDP has previously developed a virtual Headquarters and Design Studio where CDP employees can collaborate. To further CDP's mission of training military-connected behavioral health providers in evidence-based psychotherapies, a Virtual Education Center as an alternative to traditional in-person workshops.

In addition to SLIPS, CDP offers asynchronous training in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at the PTSD Learning Center featuring Operation AVATAR, which won the gold medal at the 2019 International Serious Play Conference, and sleep at the Snoozeum, for which CDP won a bronze medal at the 2020 Serious Play. These immersive learning environments allow providers to learn at their own pace and at times and locations that are convenient to them.

To visit SLIPS or CDP's other Virtual Worlds, visit https://deploymentpsych.org/virtual-provider-training-in-second-life. SLIPS was funded by an intramural award from the USU.