Pulmonary Overcirculation Requiring Surgical and Pulmonary Flow Restrictor Device Intervention in Critical Coarctation of the Aorta-A Case Series.

The use of prostaglandin infusion to maintain patency of the ductus arteriosus in patients with critical coarctation of the aorta (CoA) to support systemic circulation is the standard of care. However, pulmonary overcirculation resulting from a patent ductus arteriosus in patients with critical CoA is not well described in the literature. We report two cases of critical CoA that required invasive measures to control pulmonary blood flow before surgical repair of the CoA. Both patients had signs of decreased oxygen delivery, hyperlactatemia, and systemic to pulmonary flow via the ductus arteriosus. One patient required surgical pulmonary artery banding and the second patient underwent pulmonary flow restrictor device placement for the control of pulmonary blood flow. A rapid improvement in oxygen delivery and normalization of lactate levels were observed after control of pulmonary overcirculation. Both patients underwent successful surgical repair of the coarctation A and were discharged home.

Fetal Right Heart Strain in Systemic Right Ventricles and Impact on Post-surgical Outcomes.

Patients with hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS) and its variants rely on the right ventricle (RV) to provide cardiac output. Diminished RV systolic function has been associated with poor clinical outcomes in this population. Echocardiographic strain has emerged as a useful method to quantify RV deformation. We aimed to describe fetal strain in the systemic RV and further investigate if there was any correlation with clinical outcomes. We conducted a retrospective, single center study evaluating strain in fetuses with systemic RV. We measured fetal RV global longitudinal strain (GLS) and segmental strain using Tomtec 2D speckle tracking software and compared these findings to controls. Fifty patients with systemic RV were included in the study group with controls matched one to one for each echocardiogram. Ten patients died after first-stage palliation. GLS was reproducible, with interobserver ICC 0.82. There was no statistically significant difference in GLS among different HLHS subtypes. Abnormal GLS did not correlate with worse clinical outcomes. GLS in systemic RVs in the 2nd and 3rd trimester did not vary significantly throughout gestation and did not correlate with clinical outcomes. Risk factors associated with poor outcome were mainly postnatal. Multi-centered studies are needed to determine if these findings hold true in a larger sample size.

Intolerance of uncertainty as a predictor of anxiety severity and trajectory during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BACKGROUND: Efforts to identify risk and resilience factors for anxiety severity and course during the COVID-19 pandemic have focused primarily on demographic rather than psychological variables. Intolerance of uncertainty (IU), a transdiagnostic risk factor for anxiety, may be a particularly relevant vulnerability factor. METHOD: N = 641 adults with pre-pandemic anxiety data reported their anxiety, IU, and other pandemic and mental health-related variables at least once and up to four times during the COVID-19 pandemic, with assessments beginning in May 2020 through March 2021. RESULTS: In preregistered analyses using latent growth models, higher IU at the first pandemic timepoint predicted more severe anxiety, but also a sharper decline in anxiety, across timepoints. This finding was robust to the addition of pre-pandemic anxiety and demographic predictors as covariates (in the full sample) as well as pre-pandemic depression severity (in participants for whom pre-pandemic depression data were available). Younger age, lower self/parent education, and self-reported history of COVID-19 illness at the first pandemic timepoint predicted more severe anxiety across timepoints with strong model fit, but did not predict anxiety trajectory. CONCLUSIONS: IU prospectively predicted more severe anxiety but a sharper decrease in anxiety over time during the pandemic, including after adjustment for covariates. IU therefore appears to have unique and specific predictive utility with respect to anxiety in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Episodic future thinking and psychopathology: A focus on depression and suicide risk.

Episodic future thinking (EFT), the ability to imagine future autobiographical events, is both an everyday and clinically significant cognitive process. With a focus on depression and suicidality, here we discuss evidence connecting EFT with psychopathology. Emotional valence of imagined future events has emerged as the most widely established feature of EFT detected to date, with less positive EFT being associated with depressive symptoms and suicidal thoughts and behaviors. This pattern may not be merely a byproduct of sadness or anhedonia. Promising directions for future research include clarifying the temporal association between EFT and clinical outcomes, investigating the potential benefits and drawbacks of positive EFT, and refining assessments for youth to measure EFT either preceding or soon after onset of psychopathology.

Do people know how suicidal they will be? Understanding suicidal prospection.

INTRODUCTION: Little research has been done on how people mentally simulate future suicidal thoughts and urges, a process we term suicidal prospection. METHODS: Participants were 94 adults with recent suicidal thoughts. Participants completed a 42-day real-time monitoring study and then a follow-up survey 28 days later. Each night, participants provided predictions for the severity of their suicidal thoughts the next day and ratings of the severity of suicidal thoughts over the past day. We measured three aspects of suicidal prospection: predicted levels of desire to kill self, urge to kill self, and intent to kill self. We generated prediction errors by subtracting participants' predictions of the severity of their suicidal thoughts from their experienced severity. RESULTS: Participants tended to overestimate (although the average magnitude was small and the modal error was zero) the severity of their future suicidal thoughts. The best fitting models suggested that participants used both their current suicidal thinking and previous predictions of their suicidal thinking to generate predictions of their future suicidal thinking. Finally, the average severity of predicted future suicidal thoughts predicted the number of days participants thought about suicide during the follow-up period. CONCLUSIONS: This study highlights prospection as a psychological process to better understand suicidal thoughts and behaviors.

Suicide Risk Screening Tools for Pediatric Patients: A Systematic Review of Test Accuracy.

CONTEXT: Health care settings have increasingly adopted universal suicide risk screening tools into nonpsychiatric pediatric care; however, a systematic review examining the accuracy of these tools does not yet exist. OBJECTIVE: Identify and review research on the test accuracy of suicide risk screening tools for pediatric patients in nonpsychiatric medical settings. DATA SOURCES: PubMed and PsycINFO were searched to identify peer-reviewed articles published before March 23, 2023. STUDY SELECTION: Articles that quantified the accuracy of a suicide risk screening tool (eg, sensitivity, specificity) in a nonpsychiatric medical setting (eg, primary care, specialty care, inpatient or surgical units, or the emergency department) were included. DATA EXTRACTION: A total of 13 studies were included in this review. Screening tool psychometric properties and study risk of bias were evaluated. RESULTS: Sensitivity among individual studies ranged from 50% to 100%, and specificity ranged from 58.8% to 96%. Methodological quality was relatively varied, and applicability concerns were low. When stratifying results by screening tool, the Ask Suicide-Screening Questions and Computerized Adaptive Screen for Suicidal Youth had the most robust evidence base. LIMITATIONS: Because of considerable study heterogeneity, a meta-analytic approach was deemed inappropriate. This prevented us from statistically testing for differences between identified screening tools. CONCLUSIONS: The Ask Suicide-Screening Questions and Computerized Adaptive Screen for Suicidal Youth exhibit satisfactory test accuracy and appear promising for integration into clinical practice. Although initial findings are promising, additional research targeted at examining the accuracy of screening tools among diverse populations is needed to ensure the equity of screening efforts.

Accounting for diversity in the treatment of suicide and self-injury: A systematic review of the past 50 years of randomized controlled trials.

PURPOSE: Patients receiving treatment for self-injurious thoughts and behaviors (SITBs) have diverse backgrounds, yet it remains unclear exactly who is represented in the current SITB treatment literature. METHODS: We conducted a systematic review of the past 50 years of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) testing SITB treatments to evaluate sampling practices and reporting of sample characteristics, as well as inclusion of global populations across the included 525 papers. We also assessed changes over the past five decades in these three domains. RESULTS: SITB RCTs frequently reported age and sex (98.6%-95.1%), less frequently reported race (83.4%-38.6%), socioeconomic status (48.1%-46.1%) and ethnicity (41.9%-8.1%), and rarely reported LGBTQ+ status (3.7%-1.6%). U.S.-based RCTs featured predominantly White, non-Hispanic, and non-LGBTQ+ samples. Most RCTs were conducted in high-income North American or European countries. Sample reporting practices, sample representativeness, and inclusion of global populations modestly and inconsistently improved over time. CONCLUSIONS: There has not been substantial improvement in reporting practices, sample representativeness, or inclusion of global populations in SITB RCTs over the past 50 years. Acknowledging who is being studied and representing diverse populations in SITB treatment research is key to connecting research advances with those who may need it most.

An examination of episodic future thinking in the emergency department among youth experiencing suicidal thoughts and behaviors.

Youth experiencing suicidal thoughts and/or behaviors (STBs) frequently present to emergency departments for acute psychiatric care. These settings offer a transitory yet pivotal opportunity to assess, intervene on, and plan continued care for STBs. This study examined a clinically relevant, understudied aspect of psychological functioning among youth experiencing STBs in the emergency department: episodic future thinking, or the ability to imagine discrete autobiographical future events. A sample of 167 youths (10-17 years) presenting to a pediatric psychiatric emergency department for STBs completed a performance-based measure of episodic future thinking assessing richness in detail and subjective characteristics of imagined future events. STB recurrence was assessed 6 months later. Immediately following a suicide-related crisis, youth demonstrated mixed abilities to imagine their future: they generated some concrete future event details but did not subjectively perceive these events as being very detailed or likely to occur. Older adolescents (i.e., 15-17) generated more episodic details than pre-/younger adolescents (i.e., 10-14), particularly those pertaining to actions or sensory perceptions. There was no evidence linking less detailed episodic future thinking and greater likelihood of STBs following the emergency department visit; instead, hopelessness was a more robust risk factor. Findings underscore the importance and clinical utility of better understanding the psychological state of youth during or immediately following a suicide-related crisis. In particular, assessing youths' future thinking abilities in the emergency department may directly inform approaches to acute care delivery.

Suicide-related disclosure patterns among culturally minoritized youth: Examining differences across race, ethnicity, gender identity, and sexual orientation.

OBJECTIVE: Sharing one's suicidal thoughts and behaviors, or suicide-related disclosure, allows adolescents to recruit help from others. Despite elevated risk among culturally minoritized youth, their suicide-related disclosure remains understudied. METHODS: 191 adolescents (M = 15.98, SD = 1.04, range = 13-17), including minoritized youth (38% racially, 19% ethnically, 40% gender, and 77% sexually), were recruited via social media ads and completed an anonymous online survey on suicide-related disclosure to informal support sources (e.g., family, friends). Disclosure rates, targets, and reasons for disclosure and nondisclosure were compared based on race, ethnicity, gender identity, and sexual orientation. RESULTS: Racially minoritized adolescents less often disclosed suicidal ideation and more strongly endorsed fear of negative reactions and resistance to intervention as reasons for nondisclosure, and reciprocity as reasons for disclosure, than White adolescents. Cisgender adolescents less often disclosed suicidal ideation and more strongly endorsed dismissal of suicide risk as reasons for nondisclosure than gender minoritized adolescents. Non-Hispanic adolescents more strongly endorsed help-seeking as reasons for disclosure than Hispanic adolescents. While adolescents overall disclosed most often to friends, heterosexual adolescents disclosed more to family than sexually minoritized adolescents. CONCLUSION: Racial and gender disparities in suicide-related disclosure may occur for distinct reasons among adolescents. Uncovering patterns of disclosure may facilitate detection of suicide risk among minoritized youth.

Specificity, frequency, and intent: Multiple characteristics of adolescents' suicide plan correlate with their history of suicidal behavior.

BACKGROUND: Suicide plans (SP) can be a common precipitant to suicidal behavior (SB) during adolescence, and SPs can vary in how specific they are, how frequently they are thought about, and how strongly they are intended to be enacted. To date, we have limited understanding of how discrete SP characteristics (i.e., specificity, frequency, and intent to act) present among adolescents, and whether they relate to SB. In the current study, we investigated SP characteristics and their association with SB history among adolescents who had previously considered suicide. METHODS: Participants were 142 community-based adolescents (14-19 years; M = 17.6, SD = 1.4) who reported a history of suicidal ideation. Adolescents provided responses pertaining to their SP history, SP characteristics, and SB history, via the Self-Injurious Thoughts and Behaviors Interview-Revised (SITBI-R). RESULTS: Greater specificity, frequency, and intent were each associated with modestly increased odds of reporting an SB history. The associations between plan specificity and SB history, as well as between frequency of thinking about one's SP and SB history, were mediated by adolescents' intent to act on their SP. CONCLUSIONS: It may not only be whether, but how, adolescents plan for suicide that relates to their tendency to engage in SB.

Culturally responsive assessment of suicidal thoughts and behaviors in youth of color.

The significance of youth suicide as a public health concern is underscored by the fact that it is the second-leading cause of death for youth globally. While suicide rates for White groups have declined, there has been a precipitous rise in suicide deaths and suicide-related phenomena in Black youth; rates remain high among Native American/Indigenous youth. Despite these alarming trends, there are very few culturally tailored suicide risk assessment measures or procedures for youth from communities of color. This article attempts to address this gap in the literature by examining the cultural relevancy of currently widely used suicide risk assessment instruments, research on suicide risk factors, and approaches to risk assessment for youth from communities of color. It also notes that researchers and clinicians should consider other, nontraditional but important factors in suicide risk assessment, including stigma, acculturation, and racial socialization, as well as environmental factors like health care infrastructure and exposure to racism and community violence. The article concludes with recommendations for factors that should be considered in suicide risk assessment for youth from communities of color. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Using Behavioral Measures to Assess Suicide Risk in the Psychiatric Emergency Department for Youth.

Suicide screening is critical in pediatric emergency departments (EDs). Behavioral measures of suicide risk may complement self-report measures. The current study examines suicide-specific behavioral measures and tests their potential short-term within-person effects among respondents, ability to discriminate future suicide attempt from suicidal ideation, and translation into interpretable categorical composite scores. The sample included 167 youth (10-17 years), presenting for suicide-related reasons to a pediatric psychiatric ED. During their ED visit, participants completed the Death/Life Implicit Association Test (IAT) and the Suicide Stroop Task. Recurrent suicidal thoughts and attempts were assessed within 6 months of the ED visit via medical records and email surveys. Youth displayed a decrease in the levels of distress and self-injurious desires (negative mood, desire to hurt themselves, and desire to die) after completing the behavioral tasks. The Death/Life IAT prospectively differentiated with 68% accuracy between youth who attempted suicide after their ED visit and those who had suicidal ideation but no attempt, p = 0.04, OR = 5.65, although this effect became marginally significant after controlling for self-report and demographic covariates. Neither the Suicide Stroop Task, nor the categorical composite scores predicted suicide attempts, ps = 0.08-0.87, ORs = 0.96-3.95. Behavioral measures of suicide risk administered in the ED do not appear to increase distress or self-injurious desires. They may be able to distinguish those who go on to attempt suicide (vs. consider suicide) within six months after discharge.

The Flexible Regulation of Emotional Expression Scale for Youth (FREE-Y): Adaptation and Validation Across a Varied Sample of Children and Adolescents.

Flexible self-regulation has been shown to be an adaptive ability. This study adapted and validated the adult Flexible Regulation of Emotional Expression (FREE) Scale for use with youth (FREE-Y) in community and maltreatment samples. The FREE-Y measures the ability to flexibly enhance and suppress emotion expression across an array of hypothetical social scenarios. Participants (N = 654, 8-19 years) were included from three studies. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) confirmed a theoretically appropriate higher order factor structure. Using multiple-group CFAs, measurement invariance was achieved across maltreatment status, age, and gender. Reliabilities were adequate and construct validity was demonstrated through associations with measures of emotion regulation, psychopathology, IQ, and executive functioning. Group comparisons indicated lower Suppression and Flexibility scores for maltreated versus comparison participants. Findings suggest that the FREE-Y is a valid measure of expressive regulation ability in youth that can be applied across a range of populations.

Zoom Objective Structured Clinical Exams: Virtually the Same as the Real Thing?

OBJECTIVE: Objective structured clinical exams (OSCE) are used to train and assess resident foundational family-centered communication skills incorporating key stakeholders. In 2020 encounters were conducted virtually. We sought to compare standardized patient (SP) and family faculty (FF) assessment across OSCE and virtual OSCE (VOSCE) formats. METHODS: The intern classes of 2019 and 2020 completed a live OSCE and VOSCE respectively where they disclosed an error to an SP. The 10 minute encounter was observed by an FF and facilitator followed by a 20 minute debrief. The SP and FF completed a behavioral checklist to evaluate skill mastery. RESULTS: Eighteen (90%) of the 20 interns completed the encounter each year. Total mastery scores were significantly higher for SP assessment than for FF assessment in both OSCE [68% vs 46% (z = -3.005, P < .05)] and VOSCE formats [68% vs 53% (z = -2.105, P < .05)]. Total mastery scores of SPs across OSCE and VOSCE formats did not significantly differ, nor did FF scores based on evaluation format. CONCLUSIONS: Our current experience suggests VOSCEs are a viable alternative to in person sessions given the comparable assessment across the two modalities. The ease of participating in virtual sessions may provide a way to more easily partner with key stakeholders.

Future Directions in Understanding and Interpreting Discrepant Reports of Suicidal Thoughts and Behaviors Among Youth.

Both the quality and utility of youth suicide research depend on how we assess our outcomes of interest: suicidal thoughts and behaviors (STBs). We now have access to more STB assessments than ever before, with measures for youth that vary in what exact experiences are asked about, how such measures elicit information, when and how frequently measures are administered, and who the informants are. This growing armamentarium of assessments has the potential to improve the study and treatment of STBs among youth, but it hinges on meaningful interpretation of assessment responses. Interpretation can be especially challenging when different STB assessments yield conflicting information. Determining how to manage discrepant reports of STBs is a pivotal step toward achieving meaningfully comprehensive STB assessment batteries. Here, we outline several discrepant reporting patterns that have been detected, discuss the potential significance of these observed discrepancies, and present initial steps to formally investigate discrepant reports of STBs among youth. Developing coherent, interpretable, and comprehensive batteries assessing STBs among youth would address a fundamental step to uncovering etiology, improving clinical decision-making and case management, informing intervention development, and tracking prognosis.

Single- vs. Multi-Item Assessment of Suicidal Ideation Among Adolescents.

Several barriers exist to routine assessment of suicidal ideation (SI) in adolescents across settings, including insufficient time, tools, and training. Such barriers often result in the use of brief or even single-item assessments of SI, which may result in misclassification. The present study sought to compare single- and multi-item assessment of SI in adolescents, and to examine factors associated with different response profiles. Adolescents (n =206) were recruited from the community and completed a lab visit including a single and multi-item assessment for SI. Results suggest that two thirds of adolescents with passive SI go undetected when relying solely on a single-item screener, yet they present a similar clinical profile to those with passive SI who endorse the screener question. The present study provides support for the notion that multi-item assessment paints a more accurate, nuanced picture of SI among adolescents and may be an important component of routine screening.

Examining multiple features of episodic future thinking and episodic memory among suicidal adults.

BCKGROUND: Theories of suicide suggest that suicidal ideation (SI) results in part from difficulty imagining the future, which itself relies on the ability to remember the past. The present study examines multiple components of episodic future thinking and memory including event richness, which is commonly measured within the cognitive literature but has not previously been assessed with suicidal individuals. METHODS: Here, we tested the associations between SI and episodic future thinking and episodic memory across two studies (Study 1, n = 25; Study 2, n = 141): the first with a healthy comparison group and the second with a psychiatric comparison group. RESULTS: Future event richness yielded large but statistically non-significant deficits in the SI group relative to healthy controls in Study 1 after controling the false discovery rate. The most robust effects for future thinking emerged in the case of perceived duration of future events, such that the SI group (vs. psychiatric comparison) imagined future events as longer-lasting in Study 2. Across both studies, episodic memory was unrelated to SI, and neither episodic future thinking nor memory predicted future SI. CONCLUSION: Episodic future thinking may better distinguish individuals with SI history from psychiatric controls when compared with episodic memory, but that this effect is limited to select components of future thinking.

Examining Discrepant Reports of Adolescents' Self-Injurious Thoughts and Behaviors: A Focus on Racial and Ethnic Minority Families.

INTRODUCTION: Adolescents and their parents do not always see eye to eye. This principle applies to multi-informant reports of adolescents' self-injurious thoughts and behaviors. Although prior work has revealed the presence of parent-adolescent discrepant reports, we have little insight into exactly who is most likely to display such discrepancies. To address this knowledge gap, the present investigation examines demographic correlates of parent-adolescent reports of adolescents' self-injurious thoughts and behaviors, with a focus on race and ethnicity. METHOD: The sample included 45 dyads of adolescents (M = 15.79 years, SD = 1.42) and their parents reporting on adolescents' history of suicide ideation, suicide plan, suicide gesture, suicide attempt, and nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI). RESULTS: Greater discrepancies in reports of adolescents' suicide ideation and NSSI were observed among racial minority parent-adolescent dyads (Black, Asian, Multiracial, Other) relative to White dyads. Racial minority parents tended to report less suicide ideation and NSSI observed in their adolescents compared to adolescents' self-report. Moreover, Hispanic parents tended to report less NSSI relative to adolescents' self-report. Parent-adolescent discrepancies did not consistently correspond with other characteristics such as age and sexual orientation. CONCLUSION: Racial minority parent-adolescent dyads, relative to White parent-adolescent dyads, are less likely to see eye to eye on adolescents' suicidal and nonsuicidal self-harming tendencies.