Diagnosis of Youth At-Risk for Suicide,Pregnancy, and Drug and Alcohol Abuse

The intent of this paper is to overview three selected subgroups of at-risk youth. These subgroups are: suicidal adolescents, pregnant teenagers, and drug and alcohol abusers. Alternatives to traditional diagnostic procedures will be examined from the perspective of determining whether they can effectively and efficitently provide information necessary to develop a client management plan. A continuing diagnostic process providing the data base for a client information system is proposed. Such diagnostic practices can promote the early recognition of at-risk behaviors, thus increasing the general awareness, or early recognition, that may be crucial to preventive efforts. Discussion is provided for the use of the term at-risk. In this paper, the term is used to mean more than an adolescent who is simply at academic risk and prone to dropping out (being stopped or pushed out) of school. As used here, the at-risk group includes a number of students who are not only failing academically, but display unwanted social-personal behaviors, leading to possible adjudication or requiring community based support services, while some may even be in life-threatening circumstances.