Psychiatry
Depression and suicidal risk
Ask about a plan and means, and do not discharge an unsafe person with a leaflet alone.
Educational only. A local note appears only when a public source is attached. This page does not say that one exam, or training in one country, makes you eligible to practice in another.
Global core
Low mood with loss of pleasure, sleep, and function may be a depressive episode. Ask directly about thoughts of suicide, a plan, means, and intent. A person who has a plan and the means, and who cannot stay safe, needs urgent mental-health assessment and a safe place. A leaflet is not that assessment. Which statute allows detention, and which antidepressant is first-line, are local and are not stated here.
What stays the same
- Ask directly about thoughts, plan, means, and intent.
- A plan with means and no safe place needs urgent assessment.
- The law that allows detention is local. It is not imported from the country of training.
- Recognize. Hopelessness, a disclosure of wanting to die, or a visit that is really about something else.
- Reason. Plan, means, intent, and whether anyone can stay with him.
- Prioritize. Imminent risk outranks a routine prescription.
- Act safely. Do not leave him alone with a website. Arrange urgent assessment. Do not import a detention law from the country where you trained.
Local adaptation
No sourced local note is attached to this topic. That is not a statement that every country manages it the same way. The shared principle above is what this beta is willing to teach.
Exam lens
The next step when a plan and the means are both present.
Original case · shared decision
The lens above is how that exam usually frames the medicine. This case stays on the shared decision. Not an official examination item.
A 45-year-old man came for back pain. He then says he has decided to end his life tonight, he has a method at home, and he lives alone. He is sober and he asks you not to make a fuss. What is the most appropriate course?