Suicide (health and wellbeing needs in South Tyneside)
Additional Needs Assessments Required
Self-harm
A needs assessment to further explore and understand more about local issues around self-harm could support suicide prevention in South Tyneside.
Following an act of self-harm the rate of suicide increases to between 50 and 100 times the rate of suicide in the general population and men who self-harm are more than twice as likely to die by suicide as women. In addition the risk increases greatly with age for both men and women.
Self-harm can occur at any age but is most common in adolescence and young adulthood. Females are more likely to self-harm than males. It is estimated that in Great Britain between 4.6% and 6.6% of people have self-harmed (NICE, 2004). Self-harm is one of the top five causes of acute medical admission in the UK (NICE, 2004). However, even this might be an under-estimate. In a school survey, 13% of young people aged 15 or 16 reported having self-harmed at some time in their lives and 7% as having done so in the previous year.