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Published on: November 21, 2013
Substance use, suicidality, and adolescent-onset schizophrenia: an Israeli 10-year retrospective study
Gal Shoval1, Jonathan Sever, Leo Sher
1Adolescent Inpatient Unit, Geha Mental Health Center, Petah Tiqva, Israel. shovgal@post.tau.ac.il
Objective:
The aim of this study was to investigate the link between the use of specific types of substances and suicidality in adolescent inpatients with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder.
Methods:
We performed a 10-year naturalistic retrospective study of 178 adolescent inpatients diagnosed as suffering from either schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. A comparison was made between the suicide-attempting adolescent inpatients and the non-attempting subjects, by the use of specific types of substances, measurements of psychotic, depressive, and aggressive symptoms, and clinical data reported during their hospitalization.
Results:
The suicide attempters reported considerably greater usage of inhalants and lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). Alcohol and methylene-dioxy-methylamphetamine (MDMA) were also used significantly more by this group. However, no differences were found in the usage of cannabis, amphetamines, cocaine, and opiates. The suicide-attempting patients were found to have had more previous psychiatric admissions, a greater level of deliberate self-harm behavior, and a higher level of suicide ideation, but a decreased severity of psychotic symptoms.
Conclusions:
This study is the first report of the association between specific types of substances and suicidality in the high-risk population of adolescent psychotic inpatients. The strong association between inhalants, LSD, alcohol, and MDMA with suicidality is relevant to suicide prevention and intervention programs in adolescent-onset schizophrenia.
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