Due to copyright issues, an electronic copy of the thesis must be ordered from the faculty. For the faculty to have time to process the order, the order must be received by the faculty at the latest 2 days before the public defence. Orders received later than 2 days before the defence will not be processed. After the public defence, please address any inquiries regarding the thesis to the candidate.
Trial Lecture – time and place
See Trial Lecture.
Adjudication committee
- First opponent: Professor J. John Mann, Columbia University, USA
- Second opponent: Professor Åsa Westrin, Lund University, Sweden
- Third member and chair of the evaluation committee: Professor Erlend Hem, University of Oslo
Chair of the Defence
Professor Emeritus Edvard Hauff, University of Oslo
Principal Supervisor
Professor Ping Qin, University of Oslo
Summary
Young adults with hospital-treated deliberate self-harm (DSH) are at increased risks for a number of negative outcomes including DSH repetition and death by suicide. Timely psychiatric follow-up can be an important preventative measure; however, few studies have examined such follow-up in young adults specifically.
The aims of this PhD thesis were to examine characteristics of young adults who presents to hospital treatment of DSH, the proportion of patients transferred directly to a psychiatric ward, the proportion of patients who received psychiatric follow-up the first week after DSH, and finally, to assess how psychiatric follow-up is associated with repeated DSH.
The studies used interlinked data from several Norwegian registries which allowed for inclusion of all recorded episodes of hospital treated DSH in young adults aged 18-35 years in the study period 2008-2018.
Compared to the age-sex-matched population controls, young adults with hospital presented DSH were more likely to be socioeconomically disadvantaged and have a history of sick leave.
A total of 37.2% of young adults presenting to hospital for DSH somatic treatment had a record of contact with psychiatric services in the first week after discharge (17.3% outpatient attendance; 19.9% inpatient admission). Those who received psychiatric follow-up, particularly inpatient admissions, were more likely to have severe psychiatric symptoms and prior DSH episodes. The timely psychiatric follow-up did not show to reduce the risk of DSH relapse within 12 months, however, the observational nature of the study does not permit causal conclusions.
To summarize, young adults with hospital presented DSH are considerably burdened by both socioeconomic and health disadvantages. Those with the most severe psychiatric symptoms received timely psychiatric follow-up.
Additional information
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