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Suicide attempts have been increasing in adults (NEJM JW Psychiatry Dec 2017 and JAMA Psychiatry 2017; 74:1095), and rates of completed suicide after self-harm are markedly high (NEJM JW Psychiatry May 2017 and Am J Psychiatry 2017; 174:765). Less is known about self-harm in preteen and teenage populations. Using a national, demographically representative database of 647 U.K. practices, investigators examined self-harm episodes in 16,912 patients aged 10 to 19 (73% girls) from 2001 to 2014.
Types of self-harm included overdose (84%), other poisoning (3%), hanging or suffocating (1%), and self-cutting (12%). It is unknown whether the self-cutting cases were potentially lethal. At 1 year after the incident, 22% of self-harmers had a repeat epi…