Abstract
The objective of this study was to investigate the clinical and psychosocial characteristics of individuals with a propensity toward deliberate self-poisoning (DSP) who use psychotropic medications. The participants consisted of 81 (18 male; 63 female) DSP patients who used psychotropic medications. All had been admitted to, and were treated at, the Kitasato University Hospital Emergency Medical Center between January 2011 and November 2013. Participants who signed an informed consent form were asked to complete a questionnaire that assessed the clinical and psychosocial characteristics of DSP. Almost all (98.8%) of the participants had been diagnosed with a mental disorder of some sort. A one-way analysis of variance revealed that those who considered DSP for 2 or more hours before they attempted it increased their psychotropic medication ingestion dosage, although no association was found between the presence of suicidal thoughts at the time of attempted DSP and the ingestion dosage. We found that DSP patients were more likely to be unemployed, and that their self-destructive behavior was triggered by interpersonal conflict. Our findings indicate the importance of psychosocial intervention, in addition to psychiatric treatment, in dealing with DSP patients who use psychotropic medications.
