Characteristics Associated With Serious Self-Harm Events in Children and Adolescents Mert Sekmen,a,b Carlos G. Grijalva, MD, MPH,c Yuwei Zhu, MD, MS,d Derek J. Williams, MD, MPH,a,b James A. Feinstein, MD, MPH,e Justine C. Stassun, MA,a,b Jakobi A. Johnson, BS,a,b Yasas C. Tanguturi, MBBS, MPH,f James C. Gay, MD, MMHC,g James W. Antoon, MD, PhD, MPHa,b

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Characteristics Associated With Serious Self-Harm Events in Children and Adolescents

Mert Sekmen,a,b Carlos G. Grijalva, MD, MPH,c Yuwei Zhu, MD, MS,d Derek J. Williams, MD, MPH,a,b
James A. Feinstein, MD, MPH,e Justine C. Stassun, MA,a,b Jakobi A. Johnson, BS,a,b Yasas C. Tanguturi, MBBS, MPH,f James C. Gay, MD, MMHC,g James W. Antoon, MD, PhD, MPHa,b

 

Findings

Identification of very high risk and high risk profile for serious self harm event in the paediatric population

Bottom line

Study aims to assist with risk stratification of paediatric psychiatric presentations

–> however only two centres in one town included, might not resemble general population

What is this paper about

  • The paper aims to develop a profile to identify patients who are at high or very high risk for a serious self harm event.
  • It structured patients into a low moderate high and very high risk group and identifies factors that attributes patients into these risk groups

Study design

Secondary analysis of pervious cross sectional study

Population

  • Children ages 5-17 with hospitalization due to ICD 10 or discharged with code for neuropsychiatric event
  • 1098 children were included from two centres (p value between 0.3 and 0.01) according to Neuropsychiatric presentation and presence of self harm event
  • Age groups were separated: 5-9, 10-13, 14-17

Outcome

Identification of co-variants indicating a specific risk group, see graph

(red not present, green present and grey neutral)

Figure-3

Very high risk group:

Male 10-13 years old, psychiatric diagnosis of Anxiety and depression,

also Bipolar disorder, ADHD, autism spectrum and intellectual disability

High risk group

Female 14-17 year old psychiatric diagnosis of anxiety and depression, substance abuse, eating disorder (absence of behavioural and developmental disorders)

Figure-4

Weakness of study

  • Small study including only two hospitals
  • Influence of pandemic on suicide incident
  • Definition of serious self harm event up to responsible physician
  • General increase in suicide incident in paeditric population