The clinician rated suicide crisis syndrome checklist (SCS-C): Structure, reliability, and concurrent validity among...

The Suicide Crisis Syndrome (SCS) is a suicidal mental state and a proposed DSM diagnostic condition shown to predict short-term suicidal behaviors among clinical and non-clinical populations in the United States and worldwide. The goal of this study was to develop and assess the psychometric properties of a short clinician-rated SCS diagnostic tool, the SCS Checklist (SCS-C), to provide a structured assessment of patients' SCS through clinical interview.

The SCS-C, a clinician-rated measure composed of 15 binary (yes/no) items was developed and administered to 219 patients upon admission into an inpatient psychiatric unit. Factor structure, internal and interrater reliability, concurrent construct validity (i.e., convergent and divergent validity), and concurrent criterion validity (within one week prior to inpatient admission) were respectively assessed using Confirmatory Factor Analysis, Cronbach's Alpha and McDonald's Omega, Cohen's Kappa, and linear and logistic regressions.

The SCS-C demonstrated excellent fit for a one factor solution, high internal consistency (Cronbach's α = 0.87; McDonalds' Ω = 0.89), moderate convergent validity, good divergent validity, as well as good concurrent criterion validity with regards to suicidal behaviors.

This study's findings suggest that the SCS-C is a psychometrically valid and reliable diagnostic tool to assess the presence of the SCS through a swift clinical interview, regardless of patients' disclosure of suicidal ideation. Given the persistent difficulty in evaluating suicide risk through patient self-report, this concise diagnostic tool holds substantial clinical promise for improving suicide risk detection and prevention. Future studies will need to investigate the predictive validity of the instrument.