Year: 2023 Source: Crisis. (2011). 32(2), 110–113. DOI: 10.1027/0227-5910/a000057 SIEC No: 20231012
Background: Oquendo and colleagues (Oquendo, Baca-García, Mann, & Giner, 2008; Oquendo & Currier, 2009) recommend that DSM-V emphasize suicide risk assessment on a sixth axis, thereby increasing regularity of suicide risk assessments. Aims: We propose that evidence of nonredundancy with Axis V - Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) is one piece of data that can serve as a starting point for a line of research establishing incremental predictive utility for a separate suicide risk assessment in the DSM framework. Methods: A standardized suicide risk assessment protocol, measures of depressive, anxious, and eating disordered symptomatology, as well as an index of comorbidity were administered to a sample of 412 adult outpatients. Results: Our data indicate that data from standardized suicide risk assessments are associated with indices of symptomatology severity as well as comorbidity, controlling for GAF. Conclusions: These results support the nonredundancy of the assessments and suggest the utility of longitudinal investigations of the predictive utility of a sixth DSM axis in the assessment of suicide risk.