Self-harm is an increasingly recognised phenomenon and one of the strongest predictors of suicide, which continues to be one of the leading causes of death in young people world-wide. Self-harm can take many forms and may present with or without suicidal intent and both in the context of mental disorder, and without.
Self-harm & Suicide
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Suicide and Self-harm Edition Editorial
The National Confidential Enquiry into Suicide and Safety in Mental Health Annual Report (2018) highlighted that suicide in the under 20’s is rising generally and that the number of suicides rises towards late teens.
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DBT-A reduces self-harming behaviours by improving feelings of hopelessness
Professor Lars Mehlum and colleagues have completed a prospective 3-year follow-up study, which showed that DBT-A has enduring effects in terms of reducing self-harm frequency in adolescents compared to EUC.
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Low parental belongingness increases suicidal ideation risk
The Saving and Empowering Young Lives in Europe (SEYLE) randomized controlled trial (RCT) was originally established to evaluate the efficacy of three school-based interventions on preventing suicide in 11,000 adolescents.
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Social cohesion and integration in schools reduces suicidal behaviour rate
Emerging data suggest that strengthening positive social bonds and improving social integration might reduce suicidal behaviours in youth to date; little research has studied the effect of social integration, on suicide behaviours, with reference to a young person’s social network structure — namely, an individual’s position within their network and the patterns of relationships among members of the network.
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Inflammation does not mediate an adverse childhood experience– self-harm risk association
Inflammation has been proposed to be a candidate mechanism contributing to the association between exposure to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and the risk of self-harm. In the first study of its kind, researchers in the UK have now directly studied whether inflammatory processes do indeed mediate this association.
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Individual changes in stress-level predict non-suicidal self-injury
In their latest study, Adam Miller and colleagues propose that these inconsistencies might be due to a reliance on “between-person” models that compare individuals with high stress levels to those with low stress levels.
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Long-term youth suicide prevention programs can have sustained effects
The Garrett Lee Smith (GLS) Memorial Suicide Prevention Act was passed in 2004 to address the public health issue of suicide in the USA. Since then, numerous programs have been funded via the GLS program to provide comprehensive, community-based suicide prevention programs to adolescents and emerging adults aged 10-24 years.
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Family-focused CBT is not superior to enhanced treatment-as-usual in reducing suicide attempts
In 2011, Esposito-Smythers et al. reported that integrated outpatient cognitive-behavioural therapy (I-CBT) significantly reduced substance use, suicidal behaviours, and the rate of health service use compared with enhanced treatment-as-usual (E-TAU) in adolescents with co-occurring alcohol or drug use disorder and suicidality.
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DBT is effective for youth with high levels of emotion dysregulation
In 2019, Molly Adrian and colleagues examined the predictors and moderators of treatment outcomes for suicidal adolescents who participated in a randomized controlled trial evaluating Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) versus Individual/Group Supportive Therapy (IGST).
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Childhood maltreatment increases suicide risk despite strong neuropsychological functioning
A cross-sectional and prospective study recently examined the independent effects of childhood maltreatment, neuropsychological functioning, and psychopathology, and their potential interactions with suicidal behaviour.
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