Contracting with deliberate self-harm patients attending a psychiatric emergency center

Abstract EN

Objective To determine the effects of pre-admission contracts in preventing deliberate self-harm in patients attending a psychiatric emergency unit.

Method Three case studies are described to illustrate examples of pre-admission contracts in patiehts with deliberate self-harm.

Results The initiation and maintenance of pre-admission contracts did decrease the frequency of deliberate self-harm.

Conclusion The difficulty in managing deliberate self-harm can be minimized by the initiation of pre¬admission contracts.

To further prove the efficiency of such contracts more controlled studies are needed