Intent and lethality of suicide attempts among female borderline inpatients.

Data relevant to variations in self-destructive behavior are reported for 40 female borderline inpatients. These data were assessed in relation to measures of the patients' suicidal intent, the lethality of their attempts, and their empirically derived suicide risk. Variation in the seriousness of suicide attempts was accounted for primarily by age, number of suicide attempts, presence of an eating disorder, psychotic features, and family history variables, with generalized anxiety disorder as a mitigating factor. In addition to age and number of attempts, concomitant histrionic and antisocial features were differentially predictive of the empirically derived risk of suicide.