Parasuicide in psychiatric inpatients: results of a controlled investigation

A group of 20 psychiatric inpatients who committed parasuicide during their hospital stay were compared with 58 randomly selected control inpatients and with 34 patients who were admitted following a parasuicide. The findings indicate: (1) The frequency of in-hospital parasuicide amounts to 3.2% of all admissions. (2) Apart from the more frequent past suicidal activity of the in-hospital parasuicide group, no really important differences were identified between these and control patients. The broad definition of parasuicide probably accounts for this result. (3) The patients who committed parasuicide before admission represent a diagnostically different, clinically less severely ill population. The differences between both groups of parasuicide patients support the notion of the heterogeneity of the parasuicide population.