ABSTRACT
In 2011, teen suicide rates rose from 10.8 to 14.2 per 100,000, making it more likely for teens to die from suicide than from homicide (Carroll, 2017). According to the Centers for Disease Control, there were over 21,000 suicides from firearms in 2014. Suicide remains the second-leading cause of death among 15- to 24-year-olds (Parekh, 2018). And affirming every empirical study to date, the American Academy of Pediatrics (2012) asserts that “the presence of guns in the home increases the risk of lethal suicidal acts among adolescents,” recommending that “health care professionals should counsel the parents of all adolescents to remove guns from the home or restrict access to them” (Dowd & Sege, 2012, p. 1421).
