Citation

Mughal F, Troya MI, Townsend E, Chew-Graham CA. Lancet Psychiatry 2019; 6(9): 724.

Affiliation

Research Institute for Primary Care and Health Sciences, Keele University, Keele ST5 5BG, UK; Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust, Stafford, UK.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/S2215-0366(19)30280-9

PMID

31448751

Abstract

Sally McManus and colleagues identify that one in five young women in England self-harmed in 2014, the highest reported prevalence of self-harm in young people to date. The number of young women (16–25 years) presenting to primary care after self-harm is increasing in the UK, and McManus and colleagues argue that young people who self-harm should be offered help and support in primary care.

At present, primary care has no effective targeted self-harm interventions to offer for young people. Clinical guidelines on self-harm from the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence have little guidance for primary care practitioners on how to manage self-harm; however a nationwide and worldwide move towards integrated primary mental health-care services is taking place, in an attempt to manage mental illness and self-harm.

The role of primary care needs to be optimised, in part through the development and testing of primary care interventions to build an evidence base and ultimately enable the commissioning of new services in the UK, with the capacity for adaptation and translation in global primary care settings...

Language: en