Self-harm Behaviour Among the Most At-risk Adolescents

In the proposed study, three objectives will be pursued:

1. To develop a method to identify more effectively the acute and long-term risk of adolescents with the most threatening self-harm behaviours. 2. To identify the factors that influence the risk of self-harm behaviours and the success of treatment/treatment of these behaviours in the most at-risk adolescents (changes in these factors). 3. Develop guidelines for more effective treatment of the most at-risk adolescents.

For this purpose, a sample of approximately 200 young people who will be hospitalised for suicide risk (the most at risk in Slovenia) and an approximately equal number of healthy adolescents will be included. At inclusion, the presence of several factors will be assessed by reviewing demographic data, clinical diagnosis, self-assessment questionnaires and clinical psychological tests (CSSRS, B-NSSI-AT, ISAS, LPFS-BF2.0, BPFSC-11, TSCC, PAI, ECR-RS, DASA-YV, ASHRS), social assessment, and blood sampling for genetic analyses (DNA isolation, sequencing, nucleotide sequence recognition, quantification and evaluation of short tandem repeats, identification of methylation sites). Longitudinal tracking of autoaggressive events and heteroaggressive events during hospitalisation will be performed and recorded on an ongoing basis. The risk and protective factors of the adolescents most at risk will be compared with a control group of adolescents. The same factors will be reassessed in the most at-risk adolescents after 6 and 18 months of treatment as usual. The data will be collected in a data entry and storage system that will ensure the privacy of the data entered in accordance with the GDPR.

This will allow the investigators to identify young people at particular risk of severe self-harm behaviour more reliably, to target them for more intensive and effective treatment, and thus to improve their safety, quality of life and prognosis in the short and long term.