Developing an assessment of fire-setting to guide treatment in secure settings: the St Andrew's Fire and Arson Risk Instrument (SAFARI).

BACKGROUND

Arson and fire-setting are highly prevalent among patients in secure psychiatric settings but there is an absence of valid and reliable assessment instruments and no evidence of a significant approach to intervention.

AIMS: To develop a semi-structured interview assessment specifically for fire-setting to augment structured assessments of risk and need.

METHOD: The extant literature was used to frame interview questions relating to the antecedents, behaviour and consequences necessary to formulate a functional analysis. Questions also covered readiness to change, fire-setting self-efficacy, the probability of future fire-setting, barriers to change, and understanding of fire-setting behaviour. The assessment concludes with indications for assessment and a treatment action plan. The inventory was piloted with a sample of women in secure care and was assessed for comprehensibility, reliability and validity.

RESULTS

Staff rated the St Andrews Fire and Risk Instrument (SAFARI) as acceptable to patients and easy to administer. SAFARI was found to be comprehensible by over 95% of the general population, to have good acceptance, high internal reliability, substantial test-retest reliability and validity.

CONCLUSIONS

SAFARI helps to provide a clear explanation of fire-setting in terms of the complex interplay of antecedents and consequences and facilitates the design of an individually tailored treatment programme in sympathy with a cognitive-behavioural approach. Further studies are needed to verify the reliability and validity of SAFARI with male populations and across settings.