Psychiatric malpractice: liability for suicide and attempted self-destruction.
One of the many observations of changes in doctor-patient relationships is in regard to psychiatric problems. First, patients have become more sophisticated in their comprehension of these problems and have become more willing than previously to talk about these conditions and simultaneously to be managed for these problems by primary care physicians--sometimes in preference to a psychiatrist. Secondly, primary care physicians have changed their perceptions of patients' psychiatric problems. They have developed a greater comprehension of these problems--particularly as they relate to somatic complaints. One result of this has been that physicians are now able to detect these problems and to intervene before the problem reaches serious proportions. One of these psychiatric disasters is suicide, and it is to this subject that this article is devoted. Obviously, it is a subject as applicable and important to the primary care physician as it is to the psychiatrist, as both encounter patients in situations and with conditions that have the potential for leading to self-destruction.
D006801:Humans; D008318:Malpractice / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D011570:Psychiatry; D014481:United States; D000092864:Suicide Prevention