Am J Psychiatry 1988; 145:1424-1427
Copyright © 1988 by American Psychiatric Association
Intent and lethality of suicide attempts among female borderline inpatients
SL Shearer, CP Peters, MS Quaytman and BE Wadman
Personality Disorder Treatment Program, Sheppard and Enoch Pratt Hospital, Baltimore, MD 21204.
Data relevant to variations in self-destructive behavior are reported for
40 female borderline inpatients. These data were assessed in relation to
measures of the patients' suicidal intent, the lethality of their attempts,
and their empirically derived suicide risk. Variation in the seriousness of
suicide attempts was accounted for primarily by age, number of suicide
attempts, presence of an eating disorder, psychotic features, and family
history variables, with generalized anxiety disorder as a mitigating
factor. In addition to age and number of attempts, concomitant histrionic
and antisocial features were differentially predictive of the empirically
derived risk of suicide.
