Relatives' experiences of brief admission in borderline personality disorder and self-harming behaviour

AIM

The aim of this study is to describe experiences of brief admission (BA) of people with borderline personality disorder and self-harming behaviour, from the perspective of their relatives.

DESIGN

A descriptive qualitative design was chosen.

METHODS

Twelve relatives of people with borderline personality disorder and self-harming behaviour who had access to BA were interviewed. Data were analysed with qualitative conventional content analysis.

RESULTS

One overarching category: Hope for the future and three categories occurred: Breathing space, Personal responsibility and Structure. BA created hope for the future and the relatives appreciated that BA is a freer and easily accessible form of care that enables help at an early stage, compared with usual care. When BA functions, the structure and pre-determined days of care give relatives a breathing space, and the uncertainty diminishes for the children, as the parent can still be present during inpatient care. The lack of places was described as a disadvantage of BA.

Risk of coronary stenosis after adjuvant radiotherapy for breast cancer

Purpose

Adjuvant radiotherapy (RT) for breast cancer is associated with an increased risk of ischemic heart disease. We examined the risk of coronary artery stenosis in a large cohort of women with breast cancer receiving adjuvant RT.

Methods

A cohort of women diagnosed with breast cancer between 1992 and 2012 in three Swedish health care regions (n = 57,066) were linked to the Swedish Coronary Angiography and Angioplasty Registry (SCAAR) to identify women receiving RT who subsequently underwent a percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) due to coronary stenosis. Cox regression analyses were performed to examine risk of a coronary intervention and competing risk analyses were performed to calculate cumulative incidence.

Results

A total of 649 women with left-sided breast cancer and 494 women with right-sided breast cancer underwent a PCI. Women who received left-sided RT had a significantly higher risk of a PCI in the left anterior descending artery (LAD) compared to women who received right-sided RT, hazard ratio (HR) 1.44 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.21–1.77, p < 0.001). For the proximal, mid, and distal LAD, the HRs were 1.60 (95% CI 1.22–2.10), 1.38 (95% CI 1.07–1.78), and 2.43 (95% CI 1.33–4.41), respectively. The cumulative incidence of coronary events at 25 years from breast cancer diagnosis were 7.0% in women receiving left-sided RT and 4.4% in women receiving right-sided RT.

Conclusion

Implementing and further developing techniques that lower cardiac doses is important in order to reduce the risk of long-term side effects of adjuvant RT for breast cancer.

Supplementary Information

The online version of this article (10.1007/s00066-022-01927-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.