Psychiatric intervention and repeated admission to emergency centres due to drug overdose

Akiko Kanehara; Hayato Yamana; Hideo Yasunaga; Hiroki Matsui; Shuntaro Ando; Tsuyoshi Okamura; Yousuke Kumakura; Kiyohide Fushimi; Kiyoto Kasai

doi:10.1192/bjpo.bp.115.002204

Psychiatric intervention and repeated admission to emergency centres due to drug overdose

BJPsych Open. 2015 Nov 9;1(2):158-163. doi: 10.1192/bjpo.bp.115.002204. eCollection 2015 Oct.

Authors

Akiko Kanehara¹, Hayato Yamana², Hideo Yasunaga², Hiroki Matsui², Shuntaro Ando³, Tsuyoshi Okamura⁴, Yousuke Kumakura⁴, Kiyohide Fushimi⁵, Kiyoto Kasai⁶

Affiliations

¹ , MPH, Department of Youth Mental Health, Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
² , MD, MPH, , MD, PhD, and , MPH, Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Health Economics, School of Public Health, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
³ , MD, MScPH, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Medical Science, Tokyo, Japan.
⁴ , MD, PhD, , MD, Department of Neuropsychiatry, The University of Tokyo Hospital, Tokyo, Japan.
⁵ , MD, PhD, Department of Health Policy and Informatics, Tokyo Medical and Dental University Graduate School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan.
⁶ , MD, PhD, Department of Neuropsychiatry, The University of Tokyo Hospital, Tokyo, Japan.

Abstract

Background: Repeated drug overdose is a major risk factor for suicide. Data are lacking on the effect of psychiatric intervention on preventing repeated drug overdose.

Aims: To investigate whether psychiatric intervention was associated with reduced readmission to emergency centres due to drug overdose.

Method: Using a Japanese national in-patient database, we identified patients who were first admitted to emergency centres for drug overdose in 2010-2012. We used propensity score matching for patient and hospital factors to compare readmission rates between intervention (patients undergoing psychosocial assessment) and unexposed groups.

Results: Of 29 564 eligible patients, 13 035 underwent psychiatric intervention. In the propensity-matched 7938 pairs, 1304 patients were readmitted because of drug overdose. Readmission rate was lower in the intervention than in the unexposed group (7.3% v. 9.1% respectively, P<0.001).

Conclusions: Psychiatric intervention was associated with reduced readmission in patients who had taken a drug overdose.

Declaration of interest: None.

Copyright and usage: © The Royal College of Psychiatrists 2015. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Non-Commercial, No Derivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) licence.