Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-m6dg7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-17T18:05:13.819Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The value of assessing intent in attempted suicide

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

D. J. Pallis
Affiliation:
MRC Clinical Psychiatry Unit, Chichester
P. Sainsbury*
Affiliation:
MRC Clinical Psychiatry Unit, Chichester
*
1Address for correspondence: Dr P. Sainsbury, MRC Clinical Psychiatry Unit, Graylingwell Hospital, Chichester, Sussex, PO19 4PQ

Synopsis

Suicidal intent was assessed in a sample of 151 admissions to a general hospital for selfpoisoning or self-inflicted injury. Severity of intent was associated with the act's medical seriousness and with the risk of suicide derived from a validated risk scale. Although high and low intent cases were comparable in respect of precipitating factors, patients rated high on suicidal intent were more likely to have experienced depressive symptoms in the previous month.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1976

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Alderson, M. R. (1974). Self-poisoning: what is the future? Lancet i, 10401043.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barraclough, B. M. & Pallis, D.J. (1975). Depression followed by suicide: a comparison of depressed suicides with living depressives. Psychological Medicine 5, 5561.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Barraclough, B. M., Bunch, J., Nelson, B. & Sainsbury, P. (1974). A hundred cases of suicide: clinical aspects. British Journal of Psychiatry 125, 355373.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beck, R. W., Morris, J. B. & Beck, A. T. (1974 a). Crossvalidation of the suicidal intent scale. Psychological Reports 34, 445446.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beck, A. T., Schuyler, D. & Herman, I. (1974 b). Development of suicidal intent scales. In The Prediction of Suicide (ed. Beck, A. T., Resnik, H. L. P. & Lettieri, D. J.), pp. 4556. The Charles Press Publishers, Inc.: Bowie, Maryland 20715.Google Scholar
Beck, A. T., Beck, R. & Kovacs, M. (1975). Classification of suicidal behaviors. I. Quantifying intent and medical lethality. American Journal of Psychiatry 132, 285287.Google ScholarPubMed
Birtchnell, J. & Alarcón, J. (1971). Depression and attempted suicide: a study of 91 cases seen in a casualty department. British Journal of Psychiatry 118, 289296.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dorpat, T. L. & Boswell, J. W. (1963). An evaluation of suicide intent in suicide attempts. Comprehensive Psychiatry 4, 117125.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dorpat, T. L. & Ripley, H. S. (1967). The relationship between attempted suicide and committed suicide. Comprehensive Psychiatry 8, 7479.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Freeman, D. J., Wilson, K., Thigpen, J. & McGee, P. K. (1974). Assessing intention to die in self-injury behavior. In Psychological Assessment of Suicidal Risk (ed. Neuringer, C.), pp. 1842. Charles Thomas: Springfield, Illinois.Google Scholar
Heyse, H., Kockott, G. & Fuerlein, W. (1969). The serious suicide attempt: a biometric investigation of 100 patients.In The Proceedings of the 5th International Conference of Suicide Prevention (ed. Fox, R.), pp. 4245. London.Google Scholar
Jacobs, J. (1971). Adolescent Suicide. Wiley – Interscience: New York.Google Scholar
Kessel, N. (1966). The respectability of self-poisoning and the fashion of survival. Journal of Psychosomatic Research 10, 2936.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kreitman, N., Philip, A. E., Greer, S. & Bagley, C. R. (1969). Parasuicide (letter). British Journal of Psychiatry 115, 746747.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Minkoff, K., Bergman, E. & Beck, A. T. (1973). Hopelessness, depression and attempted suicide. American Journal of Psychiatry 130, 455459.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ovenstone, I. M. K. (1973). Spectrum of suicidal behaviours in Edinburgh. British Journal of Preventive and Social Medicine 27, 2735.Google ScholarPubMed
Paykel, E. S., Prusoff, B. A. & Myers, J. K. (1975). Suicide attempts and recent life events. Archives of General Psychiatry 32, 327333.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rosen, D. H. (1970). The serious suicide attempt: epidemiological and follow-up study of 886 patients. American Journal of Psychiatry 127, 764770.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schmidt, E. H., O'Neal, P. & Robins, E. (1954). Evaluationof suicide attempts as guide to therapy: clinical and follow-up study of 109 patients. Journal of American Medical Association 155, 549557.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Silver, M. A., Bohnert, M., Beck, A. T. & Marcus, D. (1971). Relation of depression of attempted suicide and seriousness of intent. Archives of General Psychiatry 25, 573576.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Stengel, E. (1970). Attempted suicide (letter). British Journal of Psychiatry 116, 237238.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stengel, E., Cook, N. & Kreeger, I. S. (1958). Attempted Suicide: Its Social Significance and Effects. Maudsley Monograph No. 4. Chapman and Hall: London.Google Scholar
Tuckman, J. & Youngman, W. F. (1968). A scale for assessing suicide risk of attempted suicides. Journal of Clinical Psychology 24, 1719.3.0.CO;2-T>CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Weisman, A. D. & Worden, W. J. (1972). Risk-rescue rating in suicide assessment. Archives of General Psychiatry 26, 553560.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Weiss, J. M. A., Nunez, N. & Schaie, K. W. (1961). Quantification of certain trends in attempted suicide. In The Proceedings of the Third World Congress of Psychiatry, pp. 12361240. Montreal.Google Scholar
Weissman, M. M. (1974). The epidemiology of suicide attempts, 1960 to 1971. Archives of General Psychiatry 30, 737746.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed