Adolescent Suicide

by Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry

Overview

Even the most skilled therapist may underestimate suicide potential. Careful assessment and competent psychiatric intervention cannot always predict the suicidality of a particular person. Adolescent Suicide (GAP Report 140) presents techniques that allow psychiatrists and all those caring for the health and welfare of adolescents to respond to signals of distress with timely therapeutic intervention. It also suggests measures of anticipatory prevention.

Adolescent Suicide presents an overview of adolescent suicidal behavior. It explores risk factors, the identification and evaluation of the suicidal adolescent, and approaches to therapy. It offers both historical and cross-cultural perspectives, the relevance of suicide to adolescent development, mental health training needs regarding suicidality, and related issues such as public health policies and medicolegal concerns.

The risk of suicide presents a unique crisis in adolescent development. For this reason, all mental health professionals will find this report an indispensable tool in the treatment of adolescents at risk for suicide. Drawing from years of combined experience, this committee has applied its expertise on adolescent development to the sobering problem of suicide.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780873182089
Publisher:	American Psychiatric Association Publishing
Publication date:	02/01/1996
Series:	Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry Ser. , #140
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	210
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

Table of Contents

Suicide in historical, cross-cultural, and sociological perspectives. Normal adolescent development and developmental deviations: relevance to suicide. Research into suicidality. Psychodynamics and psychopathology associated with suicide. Prevention and early intervention with the suicidal adolescent. Ongoing treatment with suicidal adolescents. Training issues. Medicolegal and public policy aspects of therapeutic care. Summary and conclusions. References. Index.

What People are Saying About This

John T. Maltsberger

If you are going to read one book on adolescent suicide, read this. It is the best overview of the problem available in print, and very inclusive without being too long. The discussions are reflective, scholarly, and informative—well presented for general professional readers, but highly useful for adolescent and suicide experts as well. Every psychiatrist and pediatrician would profit from a close reading.

Jon A. Shaw

The Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry's Committee on Adolescence have distinguished themselves by providing a book that represents the 'state of the art.' It is liberally sprinkled with illustrative case vignettes, which demonstrate the authors' dedicated clinical perspective and which make the reading particularly germane to the practicing mental health practitioner. It is a handbook and practical guide to the subject of adolescent suicide.

Editorial Reviews

Adolescent Suicide is a well-written and comprehensive but succinct text that provides as good an overview as exists in print. It is highly recommended, and it should be read by all mental health professionals who work with adolescents.... Anyone interested in an overview of adolescent suicide will benefit for the GAP monograph.

Psychiatric Services

Adolescent Suicide is pleasantly written and organized.... [T]he book is educated, timely, biopsychosocially integrated, and full of useful facts, concepts and questions. It is quite likely to last for a while. I recommend it.

American Journal of Psychiatry

[A] timely effort to provide information to those who treat and otherwise come into contact with adolescents who may be suicidal or who are at risk.

Psychiatric Times

Reviewer: David C. Clark, PhD (Rush University Medical Center)
Description: This book represents one of a series authored by Committee on Adolescence of the Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry. In the introduction, the authors define suicide as "a crisis in the adolescent, in the extreme of which coping with stress is impossible."
Purpose: The authors set out to discuss a full range of biological, cultural, and psychological factors that might contribute to suicide risk in the adolescent; to define "signals of distress" that call for timely therapeutic intervention; and to outline measures for anticipatory prevention of adolescent suicide. The topic of adolescent suicide deserves more attention, and it would be valuable to have more clinical, integrative contributions, because research in this area has accumulated in small bits and pieces. But the authors are too ambitious. This slim volume covers only a small portion of the relevant clinical knowledge and research. The chapter contents are spotty and incomplete. Research papers are listed in telegraphic, serial fashion with little evidence of integration.
Audience: The authors address their book to those concerned with the health and well-being of adolescents, with no further specification of the audience intended. In trying to fashion a versatile reference book that covers the broadest possible approach to the problem of adolescent suicide, the authors have delivered a volume that is ultimately too superficial and too scattered for any one constituency (e.g., psychiatrists or psychologists, medical students, graduate students, college students, healthcare workers) to find straightforward and useful.
Features: The book is a slim 141 pages of text. The book contains no illustrations. It would be valuable to see the epidemiology (for example) illustrated with figures. Although the book copyright is listed as 1996, more recent and important contributions (for instance, the more recent work of Brent's group in Pittsburgh and the Finnish national studies of adolescent suicide) are nowhere mentioned. The index is well organized.
Assessment: This book is too ambitious in its objectives and has organized itself around no specific audience. Insufficient space is devoted to clinical definitions. There is a consistent blurring of the distinction between research on those with suicidal ideation, those who make nonfatal suicide attempts, and those who die by suicide. Some of the literature review has a piecemeal quality, i.e., a series of loosely connected studies are summarized with little attempt at integration. Sometimes theories about suicidal behavior are discussed indiscriminately, without reference to corroborative research findings. Family problems and social stressors, as triggers of suicidal behavior, are discussed in the absence of a context of contributing psychopathology, although Brent's work (for example) has demonstrated that stressors can only be evaluated in the context of comparison groups with matched psychopathology. There are several important factual errors and several questionable claims.

Doody's Review Service

This book represents one of a series authored by Committee on Adolescence of the Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry. In the introduction, the authors define suicide as a crisis in the adolescent, in the extreme of which coping with stress is impossible. The authors set out to discuss a full range of biological, cultural, and psychological factors that might contribute to suicide risk in the adolescent; to define signals of distress that call for timely therapeutic intervention; and to outline measures for anticipatory prevention of adolescent suicide. The topic of adolescent suicide deserves more attention, and it would be valuable to have more clinical, integrative contributions, because research in this area has accumulated in small bits and pieces. But the authors are too ambitious. This slim volume covers only a small portion of the relevant clinical knowledge and research. The chapter contents are spotty and incomplete. Research papers are listed in telegraphic, serial fashion with little evidence of integration. The authors address their book to those concerned with the health and well-being of adolescents, with no further specification of the audience intended. In trying to fashion a versatile reference book that covers the broadest possible approach to the problem of adolescent suicide, the authors have delivered a volume that is ultimately too superficial and too scattered for any one constituency (e.g., psychiatrists or psychologists, medical students, graduate students, college students, healthcare workers) to find straightforward and useful. The book is a slim 141 pages of text. The book contains no illustrations. It would be valuable to see the epidemiology(for example) illustrated with figures. Although the book copyright is listed as 1996, more recent and important contributions (for instance, the more recent work of Brent's group in Pittsburgh and the Finnish national studies of adolescent suicide) are nowhere mentioned. The index is well organized. This book is too ambitious in its objectives and has organized itself around no specific audience. Insufficient space is devoted to clinical definitions. There is a consistent blurring of the distinction between research on those with suicidal ideation, those who make nonfatal suicide attempts, and those who die by suicide. Some of the literature review has a piecemeal quality, i.e., a series of loosely connected studies are summarized with little attempt at integration. Sometimes theories about suicidal behavior are discussed indiscriminately, without reference to corroborative research findings. Family problems and social stressors, as triggers of suicidal behavior, are discussed in the absence of a context of contributing psychopathology, although Brent's work (for example) has demonstrated that stressors can only be evaluated in the context of comparison groups with matched psychopathology. There are several important factual errors and several questionable claims.

David C. Clark

The group report admits the extreme difficulty in estimating suicide potential in any client, and focuses on techniques which can aid psychiatrists in the anticipation and intervention of adolescent suicidal behavior. Reflecting the committee's extensive experience, the volume explores: identification and evaluation of behaviors; therapy approaches; cross-cultural perspectives; suicide in relation to adolescent development; training; public health policy; and legal concerns. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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