The Emerging Need of Suicide Risk Assessment in Medical and Nursing Education

10.6145/jme201517

Chia-Yi Wu；Ming-Been Lee；Shih-Cheng Liao；For-Way Lung

curriculum development ； medical education ； multidisciplinary practitioners ； suicide risk assessment ； suicide prevention

Journal of Medical Education

19卷4期（2015 / 12 / 01）

186 - 195

英文

Purpose: Suicide prevention and gatekeeper trainings on risk assessment have been limited in medical education of both clinical and educational settings. Meanwhile, current practice guidelines of risk assessment are inconsistent and lacking of empirical evidence. More efforts should be made in conveying knowledge about suicide prevention via a standardized assessment tool. We aimed to review published risk assessment scales and provide initial psychometric information of a concise assessment tool that is suitable for multidisciplinary training in medical and nursing education. Method: We searched for studies related the two main keywords, suicide risk assessment and scale, in two research database PubMed and Medline. All relevant scales of suicide risk assessment were tabulated chronologically with specifi c classifi cation of risk assessment via direct or indirect risk factors. The Concise Mental Health Checklist (CMHC) was proposed and compared with identified scales of interest. Preliminary psychometrics of the CMHC was also presented for reference. Results: The findings revealed an emerging need of direct risk assessment of suicide ideation or attempt(s) under the guidance of structured tools. Scales developed through the years of 1960 and 2011 were featured according to different targets, administration method, age groups and settings (i.e. clinical or community) for the assessment. The CMHC was found to be distinctly advantageous in terms of direct risk assessment of current, past and future risks of suicide with widely applicable settings. Conclusions: Evaluation of direct risks along the timelines guided by structured tool creates preferably dimensional evidence across the timeline for risk assessment. The CMHC was suggested as an appropriate scale to be used in clinical training or curriculum development in guiding brief assessment of key suicide risk factors. Practice guidelines involving standardized operation procedures of communication skills and assessment strategies should also be included in medical and nursing education.

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