[Non-suicidal self-injury and suicide attempts: grounding of differential diagnosis]

Three criteria for differential diagnosis of non-suicidal self-injury and suicide attempts were validated by means of more recent empirical studies. Criteria concerning motives (functions), methods of self-injury (medical severity), lifetime frequency and lifetime number of episodes were investigated. Literature research showed only a few studies concentrated on a direct comparison of non-suicidal self-injury and suicide attempts. Therefore, studies examing the relationship of suicide intent to the relevant features, are considered, too. Empirical results concerning motives (functions), methods (medical severity), lifetime frequency and number of episodes were compared to the three criteria. Except for lifetime frequency, studies support the criteria. However, in the case of motives, a more differentiated examination is needed to distinguish between non-suicidal self-injury and suicide attempts. To optimize the assessment, guidelines should be slightly modified. Because of the phenomenological overlap of non-suicidal self-injury and suicide attempts, a dimensional assessment can be helpful.