Psychopathological Differences Between Suicide Ideators and Suicide Attempters in Patients with Mental Disorders

Desire for a sense of power and religious suicide in psychobiographical research: combining personality and sociocultural theories

The article presents two theoretical perspectives that provide a helpful framework in psychobiographical research, especially when psychobiographies concern religious suicide. The first is typical in contemporary psychology, a subjective analysis focused on the individual, looking at life course/lifetime in the light of personality psychology. The second one is represented by anthropological research on the concept of honour-shame and the sociological works of E. Durkheim. Contemporary psychobiography should consider sociocultural context and refer to social sciences (anthropology, sociology). This applies in particular to the psychobiographies of people representing a world of values different from the Western world, i.e. non-WEIRD people. The problem is especially true of monotheistic religions that grew up in the world of honour-shame cultural code (Middle East, Mediterranean culture). The natural human need for psychological power is then woven into a specific set of beliefs and values that may, in extreme cases, favour the decision to commit suicide. Suicide acts seen in this perspective are no longer the act of sick or socially alienated people but often the act of fully healthy, conscious, educated and socially integrated people. Such a dramatic decision may become the only way to regain a sense of dignity, strength and control.

Characteristics of Single vs. Multiple Suicide Attempters Among Adult Population: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

PURPOSE OF REVIEW

We aimed to examine the factors that differentiate single and multiple suicide attempters in adult population. We followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines to conduct this review and meta-analysis. The review protocol was registered in PROSPERO. We carried out a systematic literature search in three databases to identify original studies that explored the differences between single and multiple suicide attempters among adult population.

RECENT FINDINGS

There might be meaningful differences between those individuals that attempt suicide once in their lifespan and those who make multiple attempts in terms of sociodemographic and clinical characteristics. There are no previous meta-analysis addressing this topic in the adult population. A total of 75 studies were included in the review and 69 were included in the meta-analysis. Multiple attempters were more likely to present certain disorders such as mood and psychotic disorders, as well as personality or substance use disorders. Higher suicide ideation and suicide intent scores also characterized this group. Childhood trauma experiences, stressful life events, and higher rates of hopelessness were statistically significant in multiple attempters. Identifying the factors predicting multiple suicide attempts helps to delineate a high-risk suicidal profile that should be taken into account in the clinical and suicide prevention scenario.

Implicit cognitions on self-injurious and suicidal behavior in borderline personality disorder

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Performance on implicit measures of suicidality has been associated with suicidal and nonsuicidal self-injury. Despite the high prevalence of self-harm in patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD), no previous study has assessed implicit measures in this patient group.

METHODS

Forty patients with BPD and 25 healthy controls completed three implicit association tests (IATs) (Death words - Me/Others words, Self-Harm pictures - Me/Others, and Self-Harm pictures - Good/Bad words) and a subliminal priming task (effect of the primes "dying"/"growing" on the categorization speed of positive/negative adjectives) as well as measures of psychopathology (suicidal ideation, previous nonsuicidal self-injury, borderline symptomatology, depression, and hopelessness).

RESULTS

Patients with BPD had higher scores on all three IATs than healthy controls. The subliminal priming procedure did not reveal group differences. Correlations between implicit measures and psychopathology among patients with BPD were mostly weak and nonsignificant with a few exceptions: Positive correlations were observed between IAT Self-Harm - Good/Bad and lifetime frequency of nonsuicidal self-injury, between IAT Self-Harm - Me/Others and depression, and between IAT Death - Me/Others and depression. Correlations between implicit measures were weak to moderate.

LIMITATIONS

The study was cross-sectional only, and the study had reduced power as the sample size was limited.

CONCLUSIONS

As expected, patients with BPD had higher scores than healthy controls on the IATs, which indicates higher implicit self-identification with self-harm and death as well as stronger implicit positive attitudes towards self-harm. The mostly weak correlations between implicit and explicit measures speak against the discriminative value of IATs in patients with BPD.

The impact of the Catalonia Suicide Risk Code (CSRC) in a tertiary hospital: Reduction in hospitalizations and emergency room visits for any reason but not for suicide attempt

INTRODUCTION

Suicide attempts represent a public health concern. The objective of this study is to describe the clinical characteristics of patients visiting an emergency room for a suicide attempt and included in a suicide prevention program, the Catalonia Suicide Risk Code (CSRC), particularly focusing on the follow-up evaluations.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The CSRC program is divided in 3 phases: (1) alert and activation, (2) proactive telephone and face-to-face follow-up and (3) comprehensive preventive health monitoring. This is the analysis of the sample of patients attempting or intending suicide who were seen at a tertiary hospital in Barcelona, and their 1-year follow-up outcome.

RESULTS

Three hundred and sixty-five patients were included. In 15% of the cases, there was no previous psychiatric history but in the majority of cases, a previous psychiatric diagnosis was present. The most common type of suicide attempt was by drug overdose (84%). Up to 66.6% of the patients attended the scheduled follow-up visit in the CSRC program. A significant reduction in the proportion of patients visiting the emergency room for any reason (but not specifically for a suicide attempt) and being hospitalized in the first semester in comparison with the second six months after the CSRC activation (30.1% versus 19.9%, p=0.006; 14.1% versus 5.8%, p=0.002) was observed.

CONCLUSIONS

The clinical risk factors and the findings of the CSRC helped in the characterization of suicide attempters. The CSRC may contribute to reduce hospitalizations and the use of mental health care resources, at least in the short-term.

Development and Validation of the Self-Rating Suicide Risk Screening Questionnaire

Since suicide is one of the major health problems worldwide, the goal of the present study is to develop a psychometrically sound suicide risk screening tool named Suicide Screening Questionnaire- Self-Rating (SSQ-SR) to quantify the risk of suicidal behavior. The development process includes item generation, item revision and refinement, and validation. A total sample of 2,238 adults in South Korea was used for analysis. The results of factor analysis showed that the SSQ-SR, containing 25 items, supported a three-factor model: "Situational factors," "Negative self-perceptions and mental health factors," and "Suicidal thoughts and behaviors." Also, SSQ-SR showed satisfying internal consistency, concurrent validity and discriminant validity. Lastly, the results of ROC analysis showed a cut-off point of 33.5 for the low-risk group and 36.5 for the high-risk group. Considering these results, the current results demonstrate the SSQ-SR is a valid scale and therefore can contribute to future suicide-related studies and prevention.

Chronic feelings of emptiness in a large undergraduate sample: Starting to fill the void

Chronic emptiness in borderline personality disorder (BPD) has received little empirical attention. We sought to examine basic properties of a single chronic emptiness item, including prevalence, reliability, validity, the relation of the emptiness item to other BPD criteria, and measures of personality. Undergraduates enrolled in psychology courses over 12 years' time completed the McLean Screening Instrument for Borderline Personality Disorder (MSI-BPD) (N = 22,217). Subsets of participants completed the International Personality Disorder Examination-Screening Questionnaire (IPDE-SQ) (N = 2732), The Revised NEO Personality Inventory (Anxiety, Angry Hostility, Depression, Positive Emotions [reversed], and Impulsivity facets) (N = 10,506), and the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS) (N = 1110) as validity indicators; 10.0% of respondents endorsed emptiness. Reliability indices suggested moderate levels of reliability between two emptiness items (r(2730) = 0.61, p < 0.001). Among BPD criteria, emptiness and identity disturbance correlated most strongly (r(22,215) = 0.81, p < 0.001). MSI emptiness was more correlated with depression on the NEO (r(10,504) = 0.43, p < 0.001) and DASS (r(1108) = 0.51, p < 0.001) than other facets of negative affect. Emptiness was more correlated with greater borderline pathology than any other MSI-BPD item (Sample 1, r_tet  = 0.87; Sample 2, r_tet  = 0.86). This criterion warrants further study and attention, especially related to assessment of BPD.

Phenotypic Characterization of Youth Admitted To Acute Psychiatric Inpatient Unit Following Self-Harm Behavior

OBJECTIVE

Deliberate self-harm (DSH) is a major health concern among adolescents, and is often associated with the need for inpatient psychiatric hospitalization. The aim of this study was to identify clinical and demographic characteristics associated with DSH behavior among adolescents admitted to an acute psychiatric inpatient unit.

METHOD

We retrospectively analyzed data from the electronic medical records of consecutive admittances to a single acute adolescent inpatient unit (n = 703, mean age 15.2). We compared inpatients with DSH to inpatients without DSH and further compared within the DSH group based on the presence of suicidal intent.

RESULTS

Compared to Non-DSH inpatients (n = 497), youths admitted following DSH (n = 206) were more likely to be female (OR = 2.6, 95%CI 1.7-4), currently in depressive exacerbation (OR = 2.4, 95%CI 1.6-3.6), with concurrent suicidal ideation (OR = 3.9, 95%CI 2.5-5.9), and history of alcohol use (OR = 5.6, 95%CI 3.2-9.5). Within DSH youths, no significant clinical differences were identified between those admitted following a suicide attempt (n = 102) compared to non-suicidal-self-injury (n = 104), who were generally younger.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest that early detection and intervention of DSH and depressive crisis is warranted, regardless of the self-harm subtype.HIGHLIGHTSDeliberate self-harm is common among adolescent psychiatric inpatients.Adolescent inpatients with deliberate self-harm are predominantly females with concurrent depression and suicidal ideation.We did not detect significant clinical and demographic differences between self-harmers with or without suicidal intent.

Rethinking Suicide Risk With a New Generation of Suicide Theories

BACKGROUND

Suicide is a global concern to nurses and other health-care providers. However, deaths by suicide are only part of the spectrum of suicide, as suicidal thinking and behaviors may precede a suicide attempt. Theoretical models are used infrequently in research to explain how the individual progresses from suicidal ideation to a suicide attempt. Thus, there is a critical need to advance the study of suicide with useful theoretical models to describe and explain processes whereby suicidal thoughts transition to attempts and to suicide.

PURPOSE

This article provides a conceptual discussion and scoping review comparing historical and contemporary ideation-to-action theories of suicide.

METHOD

Systematic reviews and meta-analyses from three databases (CINAHL, JSTOR, and PsychINFO) were reviewed to find literature describing suicide theories.

RESULTS

Historically, theory applications have limited capacity to differentiate between those individuals with suicidal ideations and those who attempt suicide. Newer theories, grounded in the ideation-to-action framework, propose distinct processes explaining what moves an individual from suicidal ideations toward suicidal behaviors.

IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

The ideation-to-action theories can guide health-care providers' assessment of at-risk individuals beyond merely asking about suicidal thinking.

CONCLUSION

The new generation of suicide theories suggest that suicidal ideations are only one component of risk. The common factor in ideation-to-action theories that distinguishes ideators from attempters is the acquired capability for suicide.

Suicide ideation versus suicide attempt: Examining overlapping and differential determinants in a large cohort of patients with depression and/or anxiety

OBJECTIVE

Individuals with a depressive and/or anxiety disorder are known to have an elevated risk of suicide. However, these diagnoses alone are insufficient at differentiating patients with suicide ideation that attempt suicide from those that do not. Few studies examined such differences in an ideation-to-action framework. Using this framework, extensive multivariate testing was performed to examine differences between suicidal patients with and without a suicide attempt.

METHOD

Data were from 1576 respondents with a depressive and/or anxiety disorder, participating in the Netherlands Study of Depression and Anxiety. Logistic regression analyses were used to analyze associations between sociodemographic, clinical, personality, and psychosocial risk factors and suicide ideation and attempt.

RESULTS

Patients with suicide ideation could be uniquely distinguished from non-suicidal patients by more years of education, presence of a depressive disorder (vs anxiety disorder) and higher introversion. Patients with suicide ideation and a past suicide attempt could be uniquely distinguished from non-suicidal patients by a younger age of onset, a lifetime alcohol use disorder, more external locus of control and lower levels of social support. Within the group of patients with suicide ideation, patients with a suicide attempt were more likely to have childhood trauma and lower education, and be of non-Western descent than patients with suicide ideation and no past attempt.

CONCLUSION

This study found that although various clinical, personality and psychosocial characteristics distinguish patients with suicide ideation from non-suicidal patients, many of these often-cited factors do not distinguish patients with a suicide attempt from those who only think about suicide. However, childhood trauma, lower education and non-Western descent could aid in detecting suicide attempt risk among patients with suicide ideation.

Examining the mechanisms by which adverse life events affect having a history of self-harm, and the protective effect of social support

BACKGROUND

Psychological models of suicide emphasize perceptions of negative stressors, hopelessness and self-harm as key antecedents to suicidal thoughts/acts. Such models also emphasize the potential protective role of social support in these pathways. However, such pathways have not been tested using population level data. Hence, this study aimed to redress this gap.

METHODS

Questionnaire data regarding 24,444 patient suicide deaths were analysed. All individuals died between 1996 and 2015 and were seen by secondary mental health services in England within 12 months before their death. Mediation analyses, using fitted logistic regression models, investigated direct and indirect pathways between negative stressors, hopelessness and a proxy measure of suicide, namely, self-harm history. In addition, the buffering effects of social support were examined in these pathways.

RESULTS

There was a direct effect of negative life events on suicidal behaviors. Supporting contemporary psychological models of suicide, a mediated effect via hopelessness and a protective effect of social support were identified. Social support buffered the pathway between stressful life events and hopelessness, with hopelessness decreasing as social support increased.

LIMITATIONS

Causal inferences are inappropriate as the design was cross-sectional. A proxy measure of suicidality was utilized (history of self-harm) as all individuals had died by suicide.

CONCLUSIONS

This is the first time that population data has been used to test psychological pathways to suicidal acts involving negative stressors, hopelessness and social support. Psychological interventions should focus on increasing social support following negative life events together with ameliorating perceptions of hopelessness.

Non-suicidal Self-injury Differentiates Suicide Ideators and Attempters and Predicts Future Suicide Attempts in Patients with Eating Disorders

OBJECTIVE

We aimed first to identificate psychopathological variables differentiating between suicide ideators, suicide attempters and patients without suicide ideation or attempts, and second to identificate better predictors of suicide attempts longitudinally.

METHOD

We compared suicide ideation, hopelessness, borderline symptoms, frequency, types, number of different non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) methods, intrapersonal and interpersonal functionality of NSSI in a sample of 238 patients with Eating Disorders (1) with no history of suicide ideation or suicide attempts (n = 150); (2) with recent suicide ideation (n = 65); and (3) with suicide attempts in the previous year (n = 23). In addition, we analyzed the predictive power of the mentioned variables over the number of suicide attempts 7 months after the first assessment.

RESULTS

The group of suicide attempters showed a major number of different methods of NSSI, higher frequency of NSSI, cutting, and more NSSI intra and interpersonal functions than the group of ideators. Unlike in previous studies, hopelessness did not differentiate between patients with ideation and suicide attempts. In addition, the best predictor of suicide attempts 7 months later was frequency of NSSI at T1 (N = 123).

CONCLUSIONS

Cutting, frequency and different methods of NSSI, intra and interpersonal functions were risk factors that differentiated ideators from attempters, being frequency of NSSI the best predictor of suicide attempts longitudinally. Thus, patients with ED with NSSI should be the focus of preventive interventions for suicidal behavior.

The Meaning in Life in Suicidal Patients: The Presence and the Search for Constructs. A Systematic Review

Background and Objectives: Research on suicidal behavior (SB) has frequently focused more on risk factors than protective factors. Since the historic works of Viktor E. Frankl, who inquired how some Nazi concentration camps prisoners maintained their will to live though confronted with pervasive absurdity, Meaning in Life (MiL) has been interpreted as a potent resiliency factor. MiL then declined along a multitude of theoretical perspectives and was associated with various functioning domains of the individual. Surprising, few studies investigated the role of MiL on SB. We aimed to review and synthetize current literature on possible associations between MiL and SB, which included suicidal ideation (SI), suicidal attempts (SA), and completed suicide, focusing on two MiL constructs (the presence of MiL and search for MiL) from the Michael F. Steger’s recent conceptualization. Material andMethods: A systematic strategy following PRISMA guidelines was used to search for relevant articles in Pubmed/MEDLINE, Scopus, PsycINFO, and ScienceDirect (January 1980–February 2019) and yielded 172 articles, 37 of which met our inclusion criteria. Results: MiL emerged as a protective factor against SI, SA, and completed suicides, directly or through mediation/moderation models with other SB-related variables. When distinguishing the presence of MiL and the search for MiL, a consensual protective impact was described for the former. Data for the latter were less consistent but rather oriented towards a non-protective impact Conclusions: These findings could have clinical repercussions for SB prevention, in both suicide risk assessment refinement and psychotherapeutic interventions. Further research is needed to examine the dynamic interplay of the two constructs.

Risk factors for suicidality in Huntington disease: An analysis of the 2CARE clinical trial

OBJECTIVE

Most suicidality literature in Huntington disease (HD) is based on natural history studies or retrospective reviews, but reports on risk factors from clinical trials are limited.

METHODS

We analyzed 609 participants from 2CARE, a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial with up to 5 years of follow-up, for risk factors related to suicidality. The primary outcome variable was the time from randomization until the first occurrence of either suicidal ideation or attempt. We also considered time from randomization until the first suicide attempt as a secondary outcome variable.

RESULTS

Depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, antidepressant or anxiolytic use, and prior suicide attempt at baseline were associated with time to ideation or attempt. Baseline employment status, marital status, CAG repeat length, tetrabenazine use, and treatment assignment (coenzyme Q₁₀ or placebo) were not associated with suicidality. Time-dependent variables from the Unified Huntington's Disease Rating Scale Behavioral Assessment were associated with time to suicidal ideation or attempt, driven mainly by items related to depressed mood, low self-esteem/guilt, anxiety, suicidal thoughts, irritability, and compulsions. Variables associated with time to suicide attempt alone were generally similar.

CONCLUSION

These data suggest psychiatric comorbidities in HD are predictive of suicidal behavior while participating in clinical trials, reinforcing the importance of clinical surveillance and treatment towards lessening risk during participation and perhaps beyond. Designing a composite algorithm for early prediction of suicide attempts in HD may be of value, particularly given anticipated trials aimed at disease modification are likely to be long-term.

CLINICALTRIALSGOV IDENTIFIER

NCT00608881.

Which Psychopathological Syndromes Could Be Associated with the Risk of Suicide among Substance Users?

Background: Research has shown that suicide is a highly present phenomenon among the drug dependent population. Moreover, individuals with substance use disorder (SUD) present high psychopathological comorbidity. This study aimed to describe which clinical syndromes are linked to the presence of risk of suicide. Methods: The study was based on a consecutive non-probabilistic convenience sample of 196 patients who attended the Public Addiction Center in Girona (Spain). Sociodemographic data, as well as suicide risk and drug related characteristics, were recorded. The risk of suicide was assessed with the Spanish version of "risk of suicide". Complicated grief was assessed with the Spanish version of the Inventory of Complicated Grief. Clinical syndromes were measured with the Spanish version of MCMI-III. Results: The syndromes most frequently associated with the presence of risk of suicide were complicated grief, major depression and thought disorder. Conclusions: Different psychopathological syndromes were identified in relation to risk of suicide among patients with SUD. The present results highlight the importance of accurately diagnosing those individuals.