Question: For people diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, how effective is respite care (including psychiatric ward admission) compared with treatment as usual for minimising distress, risk of harm and in improving any other patient outcome?

Answer:

Clinical and research implications

Although one study showed significant reductions in repeat suicide attempts and the time to the first attempt in patients with DSM-IV borderline personality disorder after a short period of crisis hospitalisation, the fact that it was not a randomised controlled trial limits the reliability of these findings. Further research using longer follow-up periods and ideally a randomised trial design, is needed to confirm these findings.

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