[Self-induced injuries--surgical aspects]

Abstract

So far, psychiatric-psychoanalytic theories have been able to explain the phenomenon "self-injury" only unsatisfactorily. Moreover, the patients do not turn to a psychiatrist in the first place, but to surgeons, dermatologists, gynecologists or general practitioners. This is therefore an interdisciplinary problem. Since general medical knowledge is relatively unhelpful in diagnosing self-inflicted disease and its treatment, these patients often do not receive adequate psychiatric co-management or further care or indeed often get the chance to delegate the act of self-injury to the physician. In view of the sustained tendency for the disorder to chronify, this frequently results in severe, partly irreversible and sometimes iatrogenically co-induced physical impairments. In the final analysis, it also leads to enormous financial burdens for the agencies which bear the costs.