STaR Lab

Dr. Lindsay Bornheimer began her research program at the University of Michigan School of Social Work in 2018 and officially established the Suicide Prevention, Treatment, and Research (STaR) Lab in 2023. The STaR Lab aims to prevent suicide among individuals with serious mental illness (SMI), and particularly psychosis and schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSD). Suicide is a leading cause of preventable death in the United States and worldwide, and data show the risk of suicide death within SMI (and most specifically SSD) populations are substantially higher than that of the general population. Despite its public health impact, there are limited understandings of risk and protective factors for suicide thoughts, behavior, and outcomes within the SSD population, including an absence of effective evidence-informed suicide prevention-focused interventions tailored for individuals with symptoms of psychosis. 

Existing literature demonstrates that the majority of individuals diagnosed with SSD do not receive treatment, and many of these individuals endorse limited access to services. Additionally, we know that about half of those with SSDs who do engage in treatment drop out, and it is well-established that poor treatment compliance is a predictor of suicide. SSD populations are often marginalized, stigmatized, face many barriers to treatment, and experience health disparities at greater rates than individuals without a SSD diagnosis. Taken together, this limited access and lack of effective evidence-informed suicide prevention-focused interventions for individuals with SMI (and SSDs) is a worrisome gap in mental health services and critical social justice issue warranting scholarly attention. 

Dr. Bornheimer has combined her expertise in intervention research and implementation science to address this disparity by developing, testing, and implementing tailored treatments with intentional focus on community engagement to improve access to and quality of suicide prevention services. Efforts in the STaR Lab are aligned with the Social Work Grand Challenges for ensuring individual and family well-being, stronger social fabric, and a just society. Lab initiatives and projects also align with NIMH’s strategic plan to develop ways to tailor existing and new interventions to optimize outcomes (3.2) and test interventions for effectiveness in community practice (3.3).

After starting as Dr. Bornheimer’s small research team with a few students in 2018, the lab is now a multidisciplinary, multi-institutional team with Dr. Bornheimer as Director, staff study coordinators, undergraduate students, master of social work (MSW) students, social work and psychology doctoral students, a psychiatry resident, faculty collaborators, and community partners.