New Guidelines for Forensic Assessment.

The American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law (AAPL) recently published guidelines for forensic assessment intended for psychiatrists and other clinicians working in medicolegal roles, or performing evaluations and offering opinions in relation to legal or regulatory matters. Although these guidelines do not establish a singular standard for forensic evaluation, they are intended to inform practice. Although nuances pertaining to any given case and the pertinent medicolegal issues involved will require professional judgment as to how best to conduct any particular evaluation, the guidelines do offer many helpful tenets and guiding principles that are broadly applicable.

Risk Factors for Readmission on an Adult Inpatient Psychiatric Unit.

Objective: Readmission rates have been proposed as a possible quality metric for inpatient psychiatry. Little is known about predicting readmissions and identifying modifiable factors that may reduce early readmissions in these settings.

Methods: We reviewed 693 medical records from our adult inpatient psychiatric unit to identify factors associated with patients' readmission within 90 days of discharge.

Self-cannibalism (autosarcophagy) in psychosis: a case report.

Only nine previous cases of self- or auto-cannibalism (autosarcophagy) have previously been reported in the literature. Here, we report a 29-year-old man with psychosis and a history of polysubstance use who presented after his second attempt to self-cannibalize. This case raises questions about the underlying causes and dynamics of self-cannibalism in psychiatric illness and its relation to other types of self-harm behavior.

Stimulant-induced trichotillomania.

A prior report described the presentation of cocaine-induced trichotillomania, which resolved with the cessation of cocaine use. Here the authors describe the case of stimulant-induced trichotillomania that resolved with the discontinuation of stimulants and initiation of olanzapine. To the authors' knowledge this is the first reported adult case of stimulant-induced trichotillomania.

RS3PE presenting in a unilateral pattern: case report and review of the literature.

Objectives: To review the clinical features and pathophysiologic implications of remitting seronegative symmetrical synovitis with pitting edema (RS(3)PE) presenting in a unilateral manner.

Methods: We identified and characterized an index case of RS(3)PE presenting in a unilateral pattern. We subsequently performed a systematic literature search to identify other reports of patients with unilateral RS(3)PE.