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A Syndrome of Serious Suicidal Intent
CAPT. ALAN A. STONE, MC
Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1960;3(4):331-339.
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| Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings. |
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Suicide may be a simple act, but the events, impulses, and motives which prompt such an act are complicated, obscure, and multiple. The particular etiological or causative factors often cannot be deciphered. Psychological, physiological, social, ethical, cultural, economic, and situational factors may, and probably all do, play a part in any one suicidal act. Despite this complexity, the psychiatrist is often called upon to make a decision, to predict the likelihood in his particular patient of a serious suicide attempt.* This decision is perhaps the most difficult and weighty that the psychiatrist has to make. If he fails to commit such a patient he is left with the distasteful feeling that had he done something differently his patient might have lived. Many psychiatrists have a professional philosophy to meet this contingency, e.g., "One can't be omnipotent," or "No one can really keep a person from suicide who is
. . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]
Author Affiliations
USA
Chief, Consultation Service, Department of Neuropsychiatry, Fitzsimons General Hospital.
Footnotes
Submitted for publication April 25, 1960.
Some authors have felt that it is next to impossible to predict suicide. Compare Banen, D. M.: Suicide by Psychotics, J. Nerv. & Ment. Dis. 120: 349-357, 1954; and Shneideman, E., and Farberow, N. L.: Clues to Suicide, New York, McGraw-Hill, 1957, p. 227.
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