Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Mental Health
Date Submitted: Nov 25, 2025
Date Accepted: May 3, 2026
Use of a Conversational Agent for Training Mental Health Professionals in Suicide Safety Planning: Pilot Feasibility and Acceptability Study
ABSTRACT
Background:
Safety planning is recognized as one of the most effective interventions to reduce suicidal behaviors. The quality of safety plans strongly depends on professional training, and traditional methods such as role-playing are time-consuming and offer limited opportunities for repetition across diverse patient profiles. Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) may provide innovative solutions by offering accessible, flexible, and realistic training environments.
Objective:
This pilot study evaluated the acceptability and feasibility of a GenAI-based simulator designed to train mental health professionals in safety planning.
Methods:
Twenty nurses and nursing assistants from psychiatric units in a French university hospital participated in a pre–post, single-session evaluation. After self-rating ability, competence, willingness to manage suicidal patients, participants interacted individually with the text-based simulator for 20 minutes to perform a safety plan with a chatbot, then completed post-simulation acceptability items, and open-ended feedback. Composite scores were computed: Acceptability (e.g., helpfulness) (0–40), Realism (e.g., looking like real interaction with patient) (0–20), and Challenge (e.g., emotional challenge) (0–30). Pre–post changes were tested (Wilcoxon signed-rank), and age-group comparisons were performed.
Results:
Acceptability was high (mean 31.9/40), realism moderate-to-high (15.1/20), and challenge manageable (17.0/30). Participants rated usefulness (7.65/10), perceived learning (7.6/10), recommendation to use the chatbot for training (8.3/10), and feedback quality (8.35/10) favorably. Willingness to manage actively suicidal patients significantly increased post-simulation. Younger participants reported higher acceptability and realism. Participants reported minimal concerns regarding the simulator's use.
Conclusions:
This pilot study demonstrates that a GenAI-based simulator for safety planning is feasible and highly acceptable among experienced mental health professionals. Findings are promising and warrant larger, controlled trials to assess impacts on training effectiveness and patient outcomes. Clinical Trial: NA
Citation
Request queued. Please wait while the file is being generated. It may take some time.
Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.