Re-development of mental health first aid guidelines for non-suicidal self-injury: a Delphi study

BACKGROUND: Up to 12% of Australian adults and almost one in five adolescents are estimated to have engaged in non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) at some time in their life. Friends and family are most likely to notice signs of NSSI, but may be unsure how to intervene. Mental health first aid guidelines were developed in 2008 on how to do this through providing initial support and encouraging appropriate professional help-seeking. This study aims to re-develop the 2008 NSSI first aid guidelines to ensure they contain current recommended helping actions and remain consistent with the NSSI intervention literature. METHODS: The Delphi consensus method was used to determine the importance of the inclusion of helping statements in the guidelines. These statements describe helping actions a member of the public can take, and information they should have, to help someone who is engaging in NSSI. Systematic searches of the available NSSI intervention literature were conducted to find helping statements. Two expert panels, comprising 28 NSSI professionals and 33 consumer advocates, rated the importance of each statement. RESULTS: 98 out of 220 statements were endorsed as appropriate helping actions in providing assistance to someone engaging in NSSI. These statements were used to form the updated mental health first aid guidelines for NSSI. CONCLUSION: The re-development of the guidelines has resulted in more comprehensive guidance than the original version (98 versus 30 statements containing helping actions). This substantial increase in endorsed statements adds detail and depth to the guidelines, as well as covers additional ways of providing guidance and support. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12888-014-0236-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.