Self-Harming in Depressed Patients: Pattern Analysis

2005 ◽  
Vol 39 (10) ◽  
pp. 899-906 ◽  
Author(s):  
G Parker ◽  
G Parker ◽  
Gin. Malhi ◽  
Philip Mitchell ◽  
Beth Kotze ◽  
...  

Objective: As deliberate self-harm (DSH) is a common concomitant of depressive disorders, we undertook a study examining the relevance of possible determinants and correlates of DSH. Method: Three separate samples of depressed outpatients were studied to determine consistency of identified factors across samples, with principal analyses involving gender, age and diagnosis-matched DSH and non-DSH subjects. Results: Across the samples, some 20% of subjects admitted to episodes of DSH. Women reported higher rates and there was a consistent trend for higher rates in bipolar patients. Univariate analyses examined the relevance of several sociodemographic variables, illicit drug and alcohol use, past deprivational and abusive experiences, past suicidal attempts and disordered personality functioning. Multivariate analyses consistently identified previous suicide attempts and high ‘acting out’ behaviours across the three samples, suggesting the relevance of an externalizing response to stress and poor impulse control. Conclusions: Results assist the identification and management of depressed patients who are at greater risk of DSH behaviours.

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (S1) ◽  
pp. s887-s887
Author(s):  
E. Gattoni ◽  
C. Gramaglia ◽  
D. Marangon ◽  
A. Feggi ◽  
C. Delicato ◽  
...  

IntroductionAmong the patients, 6.6% with past-year major depressive disorders attempt suicide in their life. Resilience (the ability to respond positively to adversity) and coping strategies (the ability to manage living stresses) may be protective factors against suicide ideation and behavior. A study conducted on 100 abstinent substance dependent patients suggested that suicide attempters had significantly lower resilience scale scores. Other authors demonstrated that intrinsic religiosity, resilience, quality of life were associated with previous suicide attempts in depressed patients.AimTo examine the correlation among resilience, coping strategies and sociodemographic and clinical characteristics in depressed patients.MethodsFrom December 1st 2014 to December 31st 2015 we recruited inpatients and outpatients aged > 18 years with a diagnosis of depression (current or past). At baseline, patients were assessed with Montgomery Asberg Depression Rating Scale, Resilience Scale for Adult and Brief-COping with problems experienced; sociodemographic and clinical characteristics were gathered. Follow-up was conducted after 1 year in order to assess the possible presence of further depressive episodes and suicide attempts. Analysis was performed with SPSS.Results and discussionData collection are still ongoing; results and implications will be discussed. We expect to find higher attempted suicide rates in patients with lower resilience and less coping strategies.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (11) ◽  
pp. 1966 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jun-Cheng Weng ◽  
Yu-Syuan Chou ◽  
Yuan-Hsiung Tsai ◽  
Chun-Te Lee ◽  
Ming-Hong Hsieh ◽  
...  

Our study aimed to clarify the neuroimaging correlates of suicide attempt by comparing differences in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) among depressed suicide attempters, depressed patients without suicide attempt history, and healthy controls through comprehensive and novel fMRI analyses and methods in the same study population. The association between depression severity and aspects of the brain imaging was also discussed. Our study recruited 109 participants who were assigned to three groups: 33 depressed patients with suicide attempt (SA), 32 depressed patients without suicide attempt (NS), and 44 healthy controls (HC). All participants were scanned using a 3 T MRI imaging system to obtain resting-state functional images. In seed-based correlation analysis, we found altered functional connectivity in some brain regions of the SA compared with the NS or HC, especially in the hippocampus and thalamus. In the voxel-based analysis, our results showed differential activation and regional homogeneity of the temporal lobe and several brain regions in the SA compared with the NS and HC. We also found that some brain areas correlated with the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D), anxiety, and depression scores, especially in the frontal and temporal lobes. Graph theoretical analysis (GTA) and network-based statistical (NBS) analyses revealed different topological organization as well as slightly better global integration and worse local segregation of the brain network (i.e., more like a random network) in depressed participants compared with healthy participants. We concluded that the brain function of major depressive disorders with and without suicide attempts changed compared with healthy participants.


2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (S1) ◽  
pp. S598-S598
Author(s):  
I. Coppola ◽  
E. Gattoni ◽  
C. Gramaglia ◽  
S. Di Marco ◽  
C. Delicato ◽  
...  

BackgroundMental disorders are considered a risk factor for suicide: for example, the lifetime risk of suicide is estimated to be 4%–8% in people with mood disorders. The literature suggests that a history of suicide attempts is significantly related to electrodermal hyporeactivity and that patients with violent suicide attempters exhibit faster habituation of the electrodermal response to repeated neutral tones than patients with non-violent attempts. The impact of depressive symptoms on suicidal ideation may be moderated by resilience. Resilience refers to the ability to maintain o regain mental health despite experiencing adversity. In bipolar and depressive disorders, resilience may influence severity of episodes, frequency of relapse and response to treatment.AimThe objective of our study was to assess the possible correlation among attempted suicide, resilience and dermal reactivity in a sample of depressed patients.MethodsWe recruited patients with depressive disorders and bipolar depression; data about socio-demographic, clinical features, severity of attempted suicide and suicidal risk were gathered. Patients filled in the Resilience Scale for Adult (RSA). Moreover, for each patient we performed the Edor test in order to assess dermal reactivity.ResultsData collection is still ongoing. We expect to find lower levels of resilience in those patients who are hyporeactive and attempted suicide. Moreover, we hypothesize that suicide attempts in the group of hyporeactive patients would be characterized by planning and greater severity. Clinical implications will be discussed.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.


2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clementine Morrigan

Self-harm, suicide attempts, disordered eating, addiction, and other forms of “acting out” are associated with the trauma of surviving violence. While these behaviours are pathologized as symptoms of mental illness, they can be understood, instead, as strategies of resistance against violence. When violence is ignored or normalized, the “acting out” associated with trauma can be a means of sounding an alarm that something is very wrong. This “acting out” can be understood as an embodied form of testimony. When direct resistance to violence, such as fighting back or escaping, is thwarted or impossible, traumatic “acting out” can be a way to draw attention to and resist violence. Psychiatry, instead of answering the call of trauma by addressing the underlying violence, works to silence that call. Through incarceration, sexual violence, enforced isolation, restricted motion, threats, coercive drugging, gaslighting, and other abusive tactics, psychiatry works to undermine the embodied testimony of trauma by producing compliance. The source of the problem is shifted from the original violence and located instead in the body of the traumatized person. Successful treatment is understood as the reduction or elimination of the very “symptoms” which are in reality acts of resistance to violence. Therefore, successful treatment essentially means submission. The carceral space of psychiatry continues the work of producing compliance even after the patient has left its enclosures, extending the space of the psych ward into the everyday lives of psychiatric survivors. 


2003 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 241-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Bolognini ◽  
B. Plancherel ◽  
J. Laget ◽  
P. Stéphan ◽  
O. Halfon

The aim of this study, which was carried out in the French-speacking part of Switzerland, was to examine the relationship between suicide attempts and self-mutilation by adolescents and young adults. The population, aged 14-25 years (N = 308), included a clinical sample of dependent subjects (drug abuse and eating disorders) compared to a control sample. On the basis of the Mini Neuropsychiatric Interview ( Sheehan et al., 1998 ), DSM-IV criteria were used for the inclusion of the clinical population. The results concerning the occurrence of suicide attempts as well as on self-mutilation confirm most of the hypotheses postulated: suicidal attempts and self-mutilation were more common in the clinical group compared to the control group, and there was a correlation between suicide attempts and self-mutilation. However, there was only a partial overlap, attesting that suicide and self-harm might correspond to two different types of behaviour.


Crisis ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amanda Venta ◽  
Carla Sharp

Background: Identifying risk factors for suicide-related thoughts and behaviors (SRTB) is essential among adolescents in whom SRTB remain a leading cause of death. Although many risk factors have already been identified, influential theories now suggest that the domain of interpersonal relationships may play a critical role in the emergence of SRTB. Because attachment has long been seen as the foundation of interpersonal functioning, we suggest that attachment insecurity warrants attention as a risk factor for SRTB. Aims: This study sought to explore relations between attachment organization and suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and self-harm in an inpatient adolescent sample, controlling for demographic and psychopathological covariates. Method: We recruited 194 adolescents from an inpatient unit and assigned them to one of four attachment groups (secure, preoccupied, dismissing, or disorganized attachment). Interview and self-report measures were used to create four variables reflecting the presence or absence of suicidal ideation in the last year, single lifetime suicide attempt, multiple lifetime suicide attempts, and lifetime self-harm. Results: Chi-square and regression analyses did not reveal significant relations between attachment organization and SRTB, although findings did confirm previously established relations between psychopathology and SRTB, such that internalizing disorder was associated with increased self-harm, suicide ideation, and suicide attempt and externalizing disorder was associated with increased self-harm. Conclusion: The severity of this sample and methodological differences from previous studies may explain the nonsignificant findings. Nonsignificant findings may indicate that the relation between attachment organization and SRTB is moderated by other factors that should be explored in future research.


Crisis ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 288-295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadia Bounoua ◽  
Jasmeet P. Hayes ◽  
Naomi Sadeh

Abstract. Background: Suicide among veterans has increased in recent years, making the identification of those at greatest risk for self-injurious behavior a high research priority. Aims: We investigated whether affective impulsivity and risky behaviors distinguished typologies of self-injurious thoughts and behaviors in a sample of trauma-exposed veterans. Method: A total of 95 trauma-exposed veterans (ages 21–55; 87% men) completed self-report measures of self-injurious thoughts and behaviors, impulsivity, and clinical symptoms. Results: A latent profile analysis produced three classes that differed in suicidal ideation, suicide attempts and nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI): A low class that reported little to no self-injurious thoughts or behaviors; a self-injurious thoughts (ST) class that endorsed high levels of ideation but no self-harm behaviors; and a self-injurious thoughts and behaviors (STaB) class that reported ideation, suicide attempts and NSSI. Membership in the STaB class was associated with greater affective impulsivity, disinhibition, and distress/arousal than the other two classes. Limitations: Limitations include an overrepresentation of males in our sample, the cross-sectional nature of the data, and reliance on self-report measures. Conclusion: Findings point to affective impulsivity and risky behaviors as important characteristics of veterans who engage in self-injurious behaviors.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mathew Gullotta ◽  
David Greenberg ◽  
Olayan Albalawi ◽  
Armita Adily ◽  
Azar Karminia ◽  
...  

Abstract Objective Prisoners complete suicide and self-harm more frequently than members of the community. Sex offenders have been found to be at greater risk of engaging in these behaviours. This study examines the characteristics, prevalence, and predictors of self-harm and suicide attempts among: sex offenders that only victimise children (ChildSOs); adults (AdultSOs); or both (age-crossover polymorphous; PolySOs). Methods Data from three waves (1996, 2001, 2009) of the New South Wales (NSW) Inmate Health Survey was linked to the State’s re-offending database to identify men with histories of sexual offending. The health surveys captured self-report data on self-harm and suicidality. Results Non-sexual violent offenders (15%) and AdultSOs (14%) had the highest rate of self-harm, significantly more than ChildSOs (11%), non-sexual non-violent offenders (10%), and PolySOs (0%). Several factors significantly predicted self-harm at the bivariate level for both ChildSOs and AdultSOs, with unique predictors for each group. At the multivariate level, manic-depression trended towards significance for ChildSOs and any mental health condition remained a significant predictor for AdultSOs who self-harmed relative to AdultSOs who had not (aOR = 11.989, 95%CI [1.14, 126.66]). Approximately 23% of AdultSOs, 22% of PolySOs, and 19% of ChildSOs reported a suicide attempt throughout their lifetime, whereas only 15% of non-sexual non-violent offenders reported an attempt. At the bivariate level, few factors were significant for ChildSOs while several factors were significant for AdultSOs. At the multivariate level, a diagnosis of depression and treatment with psychiatric medication trended towards being significant predictors of suicide attempts for ChildSOs. In contrast, treatment with psychiatric medication (aOR = 25.732, 95%CI [1.91, 347.19])] remained a significant predictor for AdultSOs who attempted suicide relative to AdultSOs who had not, as well as historical psychiatric hospitalisation (aOR = 6.818, 95%CI [1.04, 44.82]) and self-harm (aOR = 5.825, 95%CI [1.31, 25.99]). Conclusion Sex offenders are at significantly higher risk of attempting and completing suicide relative to non-sexual non-violent offenders and warrant special attention. The prevalence rates and predictors of self-harm and suicidality suggest differences between sex offender subgroups may exist. These hold implications for the criminal justice and public health systems for addressing needs and identifying those most at risk of self-harm and suicide.


2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Karthik Selvaraj ◽  
◽  
Pranjali Bansal ◽  
Akshay Singh ◽  
Sushma Viswanathan ◽  
...  

Background: Contemporary literature focuses on various socio-demographic, clinical profile and psychiatric comorbitidies in patients with first attempt suicide. Aim: 1. To study the socio-demographic factors and the clinical profile of subjects with the first attempt suicide. 2. To assess the severity of depression and severity of stress due to various stressful events in patients with first attempt suicide. 3. To assess the severity of the suicide intent in patients with first attempt suicide. 4. To study the association between socio demographic profile of the patients with severity of depression, severity of suicide intent and severity of stress. Materials and Methods: Hundred fifteen patients were assessed using Hamilton rating scale for depression, becks suicide intent scale, Holmes-Rahe life stress inventory, MINI international neuropsychiatric interview. The data was analysed using the statistical software SPSS version 20. Results: The sample of 115 patients showed mean age to be 29 years, majority of them being males (58%). With most common mode of attempting suicide to be drug overdose and most of the patients had adjustment issues due to various domestic household issues and financial stressors. The severity of depression was mild and suicide intent were low (67%). In our study chi square finding association between various socio demographic variables and severity of depression found to be highly significant. It was strongest among gender at p value 0.009, occupation in which depression was found mostly among employed patients and housewives at p value 0.001. Results also found depression more common among participants with urban background at p value 0.03 and family type being nuclear at p value 0.05. Conclusion: Promoting healthy coping mechanism and reduction in stress is required to reduce self-harm. As is evident from the study, modifying the interpersonal relationship problems in the family might help in preventing many of suicide attempts/intentional self-harm and therefore important to address their various life events that might be stressful for them forcing them to take this step. In a country like India, where formal mental health resources are limited and are attached to a stigma, it is important to provide adequate information also among people hailing from lower economic status.


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