Brief Suicide Prevention Interventions May Reduce Subsequent Attempts

Ameta-analysis of 14 studies found that brief suicide prevention interventions for patients at risk of suicide are associated with reduced subsequent suicide attempts and increased linkage to follow-up care, but not with reduced depression symptoms. The findings were published yesterday inJAMA Psychiatry.“All of these studies show that we have evidence-based treatments in our arsenal to fight the suicide epidemic that work in different settings and different populations,” wrote Nadline M. Melhem, Ph.D., and David Brent, M.D., of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in an accompanyingeditorial. “What we need to do next is to implement them at the appropriate point of contact in the health care system and train clinicians to deliver them.”Stephanie K. Doupnik, M.D., M.S.H.P., of the University of Pennsylvania and colleagues conducted a review of clinical trials that involved brief suicide prevention interventions that could be delivered in a single encounter. They searched databases including Ovid MEDLINE, Scopus, CINAHL, PsychINFO, and Embase for studies published between 2000 and 2019. The studies were eligible for inclusion if they examined an intervention delivered in a single in-person encounter to patients with identified suicide risk, included a comparison group, measured patient outcomes, and were available in English.The authors ultimately evaluated 14 studies representing outcomes for 4,270 patients. Seven of these studies measured suicide attempts,...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: brief suicide interventions David Brent depression JAMA Psychiatry linkage to care meta-analysis Nadline Melhem pandemic Stephanie Doupnik suicide prevention Source Type: research