Associated organisationsBirmingham City University · Cleveland Clinic Foundation · University of Hull · University of SurreyEurope PMC affiliations are not treated as award recipients or mapped locations.
Funding£1.8M
PeriodJan 2024 — Jul 2029
In plain English
AI plain-English summary
Female nurses in England are four times more likely to die by suicide than any other professional group, yet current research largely ignores how gender and race shape this crisis. The problem is that existing studies focus on individual risk factors and pathology, using quantitative methods that overlook the diverse voices and work contexts of the 550,000 registered nurses in England—89% of whom are women and 40% from ethnic minority backgrounds. This project is the first worldwide to apply a critical suicidology lens with feminist methodology, aiming to uncover the workplace conditions and systemic pressures that drive distress and suicidality among nurses. If successful, this research could reshape how healthcare employers, regulators, and policymakers understand and prevent nurse suicide. Rather than blaming individual vulnerability, it could lead to structural changes in NHS and social care work environments—such as staffing levels, shift patterns, or support systems—that reduce suicide risk across the profession. The findings will also inform future research and policy by centering the experiences of those most affected, using storytelling and film to make invisible suffering visible.
View original technical description
Female nurses are four times more likely to die by suicide than any other professional group. There are over 550,000 registered nurses in England, 64% of whom work in the NHS and social care. Most of the nursing population are women (89%) and ethnically diverse (40% of the NHS workforce; 60% in social care). Current suicide research is gender- and colour-blind. Research paradigms and positions exploring elevated suicide rates in female nurses are limited, obscuring potential solutions by focusing on individual risk factors and pathology and privileging quantitative methodologies and positivism. This novel project will employ qualitative, philosophical positions which provide representation and visibility for diverse voices. It will also illuminate experiences and factors of relevance. This will be the first study worldwide to employ a critical suicidology lens with a feminist methodology to identify contexts contributing to distress and suicidality in nurses. This innovative, important research will address critical knowledge gaps, aiming to elucidate under-researched work contexts and under-represented experiences. It comprises six work packages led by an interdisciplinary, diverse team of nurses, critical suicidologists, sociologists, psychologists, bioethicists, anthropologists and public engagement specialists, in collaboration with storytellers and filmmakers, to generate knowledge and shape future research and policy.
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