No harm done? Psychological assessment in the A & E department of patientswho deliberately harm themselves

Objective: To determine whether psychosocial assessments of patients presen ting to the Accident and Emergency (A&E) Department at Addenbrooke's Hospit al, Cambridge, with deliberate self-harm are recorded adequately in the cas e notes, using the criteria of the 1994 Royal College of Psychiatrists' con sensus statement on managing adult deliberate self-harm in hospital. Design: A cross-sectional study of case notes. Subjects: A total of 338 patients (accounting for 404 episodes of deliberat e self-harm) who presented consecutively between 1 January and 30 June 1996 . Results: 56% of episodes resulted in admission to a general hospital bed. I n only 11% of conscious patients were adequate psychological assessments re corded in the case notes. Little psychosocial information was recorded in t he notes of those patients discharged without follow-up from accident and e mergency. Conclusions: In the A&E department of this teaching hospital, there is inad equate recording of important psychological information in the case notes o f patients who present with deliberate self-harm.