PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Mitchell, Rebecca J
AU  - Seah, Rebecca
AU  - Ting, Hsuen P
AU  - Curtis, Kate
AU  - Foster, Kim
TI  - PW 0456 Intentional self-harm and assault injury hospitalisation characteristics, treatment cost, and health outcomes of children in australia over a 10-year period
AID  - 10.1136/injuryprevention-2018-safety.279
DP  - 2018 Nov 01
TA  - Injury Prevention
PG  - A101--A101
VI  - 24
IP  - Suppl 2
4099  - http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/content/24/Suppl_2/A101.2.short
4100  - http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/content/24/Suppl_2/A101.2.full
SO  - Inj Prev2018 Nov 01; 24
AB  - Background Both self-harm and interpersonal violence are leading causes of injury mortality and hospitalised morbidity, with a significant economic and societal cost.Objective To determine the 10 year temporal trends, treatment cost and health outcomes of intentional injury hospitalisations of children aged ≤16 years in Australia.Method A retrospective examination of linked hospitalisation and mortality data for children aged ≤16 years during 1 July 2001 to 30 June 2012 with self-harm or assault injuries. Thirty-day mortality and 28 day hospital readmission were calculated.Results There were 18 223 self-harm and 13 877 assault hospitalisations, with a treatment cost of $64 million and $60.6 million, respectively. The self-harm hospitalisation rate was 59.8 per 1 00 000 population (95% CI 58.96–60.71) with no annual decrease. Poisoning was the most common method of self-harm. The assault hospitalisation rate was 29.9 per 1 00 000 population (95% CI 29.39–30.39) with a 4.2% annual decrease (95% CI −6.14 to −2.31, p<0.0001). Other maltreatment syndromes were common for children≤5 years. Assault by bodily force was common for children 6–16 years. There were 1520 (8.3%) and 654 (4.7%) hospital readmissions within 28 days and 66 (0.4%) and 32 (0.2%) deaths for self-harm and assault injury hospitalisations, respectively.Conclusions Australia needs a whole-of-government and community approach to prevent intentional injury. Health professionals can play a key role in identifying and preventing the recurrence of intentional injury. Psychosocial care and access to support services are essential for self-harmers. Parental education interventions to reduce assaults of children and training in conflict de-escalation to reduce child peer-assaults are recommended.