PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Faraz Mughal
AU  - Lisa Dikomitis
AU  - Opeyemi O Babatunde
AU  - Carolyn A Chew-Graham
TI  - The potential of general practice to support young people who self-harm: a narrative review
AID  - 10.3399/BJGPO.2021.0159
DP  - 2022 Mar 01
TA  - BJGP Open
PG  - BJGPO.2021.0159
VI  - 6
IP  - 1
4099  - http://bjgpopen.org/content/6/1/BJGPO.2021.0159.short
4100  - http://bjgpopen.org/content/6/1/BJGPO.2021.0159.full
SO  - BJGP Open2022 Mar 01; 6
AB  - Background Self-harm in young people is a growing public health concern. Young people commonly present to their GP for help with self-harm, and thus general practice may be a key setting to support young people who have self-harmed.Aim To examine the potential of general practice to support young people aged 10–25 years who have harmed themselves.Design & setting A narrative review of published and grey literature.Method The Scale for the Assessment of Narrative Review Articles (SANRA) was used to guide a narrative review to examine the potential of general practice to support young people who have self-harmed. The evidence is presented textually.Results The included evidence showed that GPs have a key role in supporting young people, and they sometimes relied on gut feeling when handling uncertainty on how to help young people who had self-harmed. Young people described the importance of initial clinician responses after disclosing self-harm, and if they were perceived to be negative, the self-harm could become worse.Conclusion In context of the evidence included, this review found that general practice is a key setting for the identification and management of self-harm in young people; but improvements are needed to enhance general practice care for young people to fulfil its potential.