Suicide management skills and the medical student

To determine the suicide management skills of medical students at different levels of training, 141 medical students were administered the Suicide Intervention Response Inventory (SIRI), a self-report instrument assessing skills in responding to the self-destructive patient. As predicted, third-year students having completed a course in medical interviewing scored higher on the SIRI than first-year students who had not. Additional improvement in suicide management skills was evidenced for third-year students who completed a six-week inpatient psychiatry rotation. Whether or not students believed that suicide was ethically acceptable in some circumstances had no impact on their ability to select an appropriate response to the self-destructive patient. Several additional findings are discussed, and the potential utility of the SIRI in evaluating medical student skills in this important area is highlighted.