ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief review of elderly suicide from both a cognitive and affective perspective and suggests some tools that are available to help elderly people cope with the conditions that cause high suicide rates. Called the suicide trajectory model, it describes various major categories of risk factors that influence the likelihood of suicide at any age. The remaining risk factor category shown in the suicide trajectory is that of environmental factors that may predispose a person to suicide, regardless of age. Before we move to consider the feelings of elderly suicidal people, we should address briefly some special issues in elderly suicide. As we work with suicidal elders, we should do so with the understanding that we all have only a limited time to develop our talents, skills, personalities; to learn and to teach, and to become the best person we are capable of being.
