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Objective: Despite the rise in specialist clinical services for the management of sports and active recreation injury, many patients attend hospital emergency departments for treatment. The purpose of this study was to describe sports injury cases presented to selected hospital emergency departments around Australia for the period 1989-1993.Methods: Routinely collected emergency department injury presentation data from the Australian National Injury Surveillance Unit were examined. Data on 98,040 sports and active recreation emergency department presentations were analysed. Sports and active recreation activities were ranked according to frequency of presentation. Relative proportions of injury type and body region injured were determined. Data are presented separately for children (<15 years of age) and adults (>15 years of age).Results: Among the 10 activities that most commonly led to a sports or active recreation injury presentation for all ages were cycling, Australian football, basketball, soccer, cricket, netball, and rugby. For children, injuries were also commonly associated with roller skating/blading, skateboarding, and trampolining. Hockey, martial arts, and dancing injuries were frequent in adults. Most sporting injuries occurred during organised competition or practice whereas the active recreation injuries occurred in a variety of settings. Fractures, strains, and sprains, particularly to the lower and upper extremities, were common types of injury.Conclusion: The rich, but nevertheless limited, information available about sports and active recreation injuries from data collected in emergency departments indicates that these activities are a common context for injury at the community level in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Engagement with secondary mental health services after an emergency department presentation with suicidal behaviours may be an important strategy for reducing the risk of repeat attempts. Our aim was to examine secondary mental health service contact following a presentation to emergency department with suicidal behaviours., Methods: A systematic review of papers published between 2000 and 2020 was undertaken. This identified 56 papers relating to 47 primary studies. Data were extracted and summarised separately by age group: (1) young people, (2) older adults and (3) adults and studies with participants of 'all ages'., Results: Studies in young people ( n  = 13) showed, on average, 44.8% were referred and 33.7% had contact with secondary mental health services within 4 weeks of emergency department discharge. In comparison, in adult/all ages studies ( n  = 34), on average, 27.1% were referred to and 26.2% had mental health service contact within 4 weeks. Only three studies presented data on contact with mental health services for older adults, and proportions ranged from 49.0% to 86.0%., Conclusion: This review highlights poor utilisation of secondary mental health service following emergency department presentation for suicidal behaviours, and further research is needed to identify the reasons for this. Crucially, this information could assist in the allocation of resources to facilitate the timely implementation of suicide prevention services.

Background: Additional to a child's genetic inheritance, environmental exposures are associated with schizophrenia. Many are broadly described as childhood adversity; modelling the combined impact of these is complex. We aimed to develop and validate a scale on childhood adversity, independent of genetic and other environmental liabilities, for use in schizophrenia risk analysis models, using data from cross-linked electronic health and social services registers., Method: A cohort of N = 428 970 Western Australian children born 1980-2001 was partitioned into three samples: scale development sample ( N = 171 588), and two scale validation samples (each N = 128 691). Measures of adversity were defined before a child's 10th birthday from five domains: discontinuity in parenting, family functioning, family structure, area-level socioeconomic/demographic environment and family-level sociodemographic status. Using Cox proportional hazards modelling of follow-up time from 10th birthday to schizophrenia diagnosis or censorship, weighted combinations of measures were firstly developed into scales for each domain, then combined into a final global scale. Discrimination and calibration performance were validated using Harrell's C and graphical assessment respectively., Results: A weighted combination of 42 measures of childhood adversity was derived from the development sample. Independent application to identical measures in validation samples produced Harrell's Concordance statistics of 0.656 and 0.624. Average predicted time to diagnosis curves corresponded with 95% CI limits of observed Kaplan-Meier curves in five prognostic categories., Conclusions: Our Early Adversity Scale for Schizophrenia (EAS-Sz), the first using routinely collected register data, predicts schizophrenia diagnosis above chance, and has potential to help untangle contributions of genetic and environmental liability to schizophrenia risk.

Objective: The interplay between genetic and environmental factors on risk for psychotic illness remains poorly understood. The aim of this study was to estimate independent and combined effects of familial liability for schizophrenia and exposure to obstetric complications on risk for developing psychotic illness, covarying with exposure to other environmental stressors., Methods: This whole-population birth cohort study used record linkage across Western Australian statewide data collections (midwives, psychiatric, hospital admissions, child protection, mortality) to identify liveborn offspring ( n  = 1046) born 1980-1995 to mothers with schizophrenia, comparing them to offspring of mothers with no recorded psychiatric history ( n  = 298,370)., Results: Both maternal schizophrenia and pregnancy complications were each significantly associated with psychotic illness in offspring, with no interaction. Non-obstetric environmental stressors significantly associated with psychotic illness in offspring included the following: being Indigenous; having a mother who was not in a partnered relationship; episodes of disrupted parenting due to hospitalisation of mother, father or child; abuse in childhood; and living in areas of greatest socioeconomic disadvantage and with elevated rates of violent crime. Adjustment for these other environmental stressors reduced the hazard ratio for maternal schizophrenia substantially (from hazard ratio: 5.7, confidence interval: 4.5-7.2 to hazard ratio: 3.5, confidence interval: 2.8-4.4), but not the estimate for pregnancy complications (hazard ratio: 1.1, confidence interval: 1.0-1.2). The population attributable fraction for maternal schizophrenia was 1.4 and for pregnancy complications was 2.1., Conclusion: Our finding of a substantial decrease in risk of psychotic illness associated with familial liability for psychosis following adjustment for other environmental stressors highlights potentially modifiable risk factors on the trajectory to psychotic illness and suggests that interventions that reduce or manage exposure to these risks may be protective, despite a genetic liability.

Purpose: Our aim was to establish the 12-month prevalence of violent victimisation in a large sample of adults with psychotic disorders (N = 1825), compare this to population estimates, and examine correlates of violent victimisation., Methods: The Australian national psychosis survey used a two-phase design to draw a representative sample of adults aged 18-64 years with psychotic disorders. Interview questions included psychopathology, cognition, sociodemographics, substance use, criminality, and childhood and adult victimisation. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to examine the independent contributions of known risk factors, clinical profile and childhood abuse, on risk of violent victimisation. Differences between men and women were examined., Results: Among adults with psychotic disorders, 12-month prevalence of any victimisation was 38.6% (males 37.4%, females 40.5%), and of violent victimisation was 16.4% (males 15.2%; females 18.3%). Violent victimisation was 4.8 times higher than the population rate of 3.4% (6.5 times higher for women; 3.7 times higher for men). Significant correlates of violent victimisation were established sociodemographic and behavioural risk factors predicting victimisation in the general community: younger age, residence in the most disadvantaged neighbourhoods, homelessness, lifetime alcohol abuse/dependence, and prior criminal offending. Among clinical variables, only mania and self-harm remained significant in the multivariable model. Childhood abuse was independently associated with violent victimisation., Conclusions: Rates of violent victimisation are high for people with psychotic disorders, especially women, compared to population rates. Greater exposure to sociodemographic and behavioural risks may render them particularly vulnerable to victimisation. Social cognition as a valuable treatment target is discussed.

The Schizophrenia International Research Society held its first scientific conference in Venice, Italy, June 21 to 25th, 2008. A wide range of controversial topics were presented in overlapping and plenary oral sessions. These included new genetic studies, controversies about early detection of schizophrenia and the prodrome, treatment issues, clinical characteristics, cognition, neuropathology and neurophysiology, other etiological considerations, substance abuse co-morbidity, and animal models for investigating disease etiology and for use as targets in drug studies. Young investigators in the field were awarded travel grants to participate in the congress and one of their roles was to summarize the oral sessions and subsequent discussions. The reports that follow are the culmination of this work produced by 30 young investigators who attended the congress. It is hoped that these summaries will be useful synopses of what actually occurred at the congress for those who did not attend each session or were unable to be present. The abstracts of all presentations, as submitted by the authors a few months prior, were previously published as supplement 2 to volume 102/1-3, June 2008.

Medical coverage services have the potential to play a key role in sports injury surveillance activities. Provided that injury surveillance activities are fully coordinated and a standardised data collection procedure is implemented, valuable sports injury information can be obtained by medical coverage personnel. This paper describes the development of a standardised injury data collection form for use by medical coverage personnel during large sporting events. The form was trialed during two large sporting events in Melbourne, Australia in 1995. A range of sports medicine and sports first aid personnel was involved in the trial and injury details were collected on all persons receiving treatment from the coverage team, irrespective of injury severity. The final sports injury data collection form is easy to use, can be used by all types of medical coverage personnel and can provide valuable data in a timely manner. The form has since been adopted as the injury data collection standard at a number of major Australian sporting events. Recommendations for incorporating injury surveillance activities when organising sporting events and planning medical coverage services are given. Suggestions for maximising compliance with data collection procedures are also discussed.