{"id":2612,"date":"2023-07-20T12:30:13","date_gmt":"2023-07-20T16:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/?page_id=2612"},"modified":"2023-10-10T09:40:14","modified_gmt":"2023-10-10T13:40:14","slug":"why-are-we-doing-this","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/why-are-we-doing-this\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Are We Doing This?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Autism and Suicide<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Suicide is the second leading cause of death among young people ages 12-24. <\/span>The rate of suicide in young people has increased by more than 46%, while rates of other leading causes of death have declined<\/span><\/span>.<\/span> The enormous emotional, physical, and financial impact of suicide and related behaviors affects youth, families, communities, clinicians, and healthcare systems<\/span><\/span>. <\/span>Autistic individuals are at particularly high risk for suicide. Compared to the general population, they are:<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n
  1. up to nine times more likely to experience suicidal ideation<\/span><\/li>\n
  2. up to five times more likely to attempt suicide, and<\/li>\n
  3. over seven times more likely to die by suicide.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
    \n

    T<\/span>he autism community has identified adapting suicide prevention interventions for autistic people as a top priority<\/span><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n
    \u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

    Safety Planning Intervention (SPI)<\/span><\/h2>\n
    \n

    The largest Safety Planning Intervention (SPI) trial demonstrated the effectiveness of SPI plus structured follow-up contacts (SPI+) relative to usual care (without safety plans) in non-autistic patients (Stanley et al., 2018<\/a>)<\/span><\/span>. In this study, suicidal patients who received SPI+ had 45% fewer suicidal behaviors. <\/span>They were also more than twice more likely to access outpatient mental health treatment within 6 months of a suicide-related emergency department (ED) visit<\/span><\/span>. In routine clinical practice, but, SPI implementation varies. <\/span>It is often limited to a single encounter (without follow-up) in non-specialty mental health settings (e.g., ED, primary care)<\/span><\/span>. <\/span>Citing this large study in their clinical guidelines, the Joint Commission and the American Association of Pediatrics recommend SPI as a first-line suicide prevention intervention<\/span><\/span>. Yet, neither guideline includes the follow-up component in their description.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n

    \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    Current Study<\/span><\/h2>\n
    \n

    To date, we don’t know much about which of these two approaches is more effective in general, and with autistic individuals in particular<\/span><\/span>. <\/span>Without research-based guidance, providers face a difficult decision about which adapted approach to SPI is more effective for autistic patients<\/span>: <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

      \n
    1. SPI-A delivered in a single encounter; or<\/span><\/li>\n
    2. SPI-A+, modeled after a multi-component, evidence-based intervention.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
      \n

      The <\/span>goal<\/span> of this study is to compare the effectiveness of these two tailored suicide prevention approaches among autistic youth<\/span><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

      This study is available on ClinicalTrials.gov. Learn more about the study<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Autism and Suicide Suicide is the second leading cause of death among young people ages 12-24. The rate of suicide in young people has increased by more than 46%, while rates of other leading causes of death have declined. The enormous emotional, physical, and financial impact of suicide and related behaviors affects youth, families, communities, … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":113267,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-2612","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","odd"],"acf":[],"_links_to":[],"_links_to_target":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/113267"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2612\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/aaset-sp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}