Suicide attempts and suicides as determinants of quality and safety within hospital system of mental health care services
Autori:
Marko Ćurković, Porin Makarić, Arian Bljakčori, Senka Repovečki, Jasna Mesarić, Petrana Brečić
Sažetak
Summary
The hospital part of the mental health care system is exposed to all safety challenges as other parts of the hospital health care system in general, but besides them it is also exposed to additional, rather unique safety challenges, of which one is certainly related to the provision of care for suicidal patients. As the extreme manifestation of the continuum of suicidality – suicide, especially within the hospital part of health care system, can represent a valid indicator of the health care safety. The same is recognized by the legal framework in the Republic of Croatia, which classifies attempted suicide and suicide as an unexpected adverse event. However,efforts to prevent suicide and suicide attempts are fraught with numerous challenges, which we in this review article present through several interwoven (sub)units: assessment and prediction of suicidality (that is, the risk of suicide), admission to hospital, treatment and observation (oversight) during hospital treatment, discharge from hospital and further follow-up arrangements. Despite all the challenges, suicide prevention is a central challenge to patient safety in the hospital system of mental health care.