Category: News

We are so proud to congratulate Christian Rück on receiving the prestigious August Prize 2024 in the category of “Non-Fiction Book of the Year” for his remarkable work, “Ett liv värt att leva: Varför självmord blev människans följeslagare” (A Life Worth Living: Why Suicide Became Humanity’s Companion).

Award Motivation:

“A book about suicide in history, culture, and in our consciences. Christian Rück writes with nuance, deep insight, and a liberating clarity about this incredibly difficult subject. Seemingly anecdotal, the short stories about individuals who have taken, considered, or feared ending their lives form a cohesive whole. This book connects with anyone who has been touched by life’s darkness, those who stood by, and those who have read or heard about it without being directly affected. A book that successfully navigates through and beyond the taboos surrounding the subject.”

Congrats Christian!

Learn more about the August Prize

This week, Christian Rück, Robin Fondberg, and Lisa Gunnarsson contributed with an insightful commentary in Läkartidningen titled “Five Myths About Open Science”.

In their piece, they explore common misconceptions about open science practices and highlight how these methods can improve the transparency, reliability, and usefulness of research. Drawing from real-world examples, they explain the critical role of preregistration, data sharing, and other open science tools in addressing challenges like the replication crisis and publication bias.

You can read the article here.

Last week, Christian Rück took part in a panel discussion during Karolinska’s annual FoU Day. This year’s theme, “Goda vanor mot psykiska besvär – funkar det?” (“Healthy Habits Against Mental Illness – Do They Work?”), brought together researchers and clinicians from Psychiatry South Stockholm to discuss how healthy habits can impact mental health.

The panel discussed how research can be translated into clinical practice to improve patient outcomes. When asked what defines “good research,” Christian highlighted the importance of its practical application:

“Good research is more than just studies on paper—it’s research that reaches people in real-life settings and makes a difference.”

Alongside Christian, the panel featured Lina Martinsson, Maria Bragesjö, Sarah Gullbjörk, Henrik Malaise, Sandra Tamm, Kerstin Blom, Susanna Jernelöv, Cecilia Svanborg, Anna Irestig, moderated by Maria Larsson, chair of the Swedish Psychiatric Association.

As part of the Centre for Psychiatry Research’s Suicide Seminar series, Dr. Jill Harkavy-Friedman from Columbia University recently delivered a talk titled “Understanding Suicide in the United States in a Global Context.”

With over 35 years of experience, Dr. Harkavy-Friedman—Senior Vice President of Research at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and Associate Professor at Columbia University—shared insights from her extensive research on suicidal behavior among adolescents and adults.

The seminar explored suicide prevention in both U.S. and global frameworks, translating cutting-edge research into clinical applications. Dr. Harkavy-Friedman was the first to investigate suicidal ideation among high school students, a groundbreaking contribution to the field.

This series, hosted by Professor Christian Rück, features leading experts from around the world and aims to deepen our understanding of suicide prevention.

Missed the seminar?
You can watch the full recording here.

We are excited to announce several new grants awarded to members of our research group by Forte. These grants will support important projects aimed at improving psychiatric care, focusing on innovative interventions, ethical challenges, and understanding patient outcomes.

Fredrik Johansson
Type of grant: Establishment Grant
Project Title: Restraint, Seclusion and Forced Medication in Compulsory Psychiatric In-patient Care: Who are Exposed and What Follows?
Grant Amount: 3,543,000 SEK
Project description: The project will investigate the quality of Swedish register data on coercive interventions in involuntary psychiatric in-patient care in order to: 1) determine the occurrence of coercive interventions, 2) identify risk factors of coercive interventions, and 3) determine long-term outcomes of coercive interventions, among persons in involuntary psychiatric in-patient care.

Oskar Flygare
Type of grant: Establishment Grant
Project Title: The Effect of Augmenting Standard Care with Caring Text Messages for Suicide Prevention – A Randomized Clinical Trial
Grant Amount: 3,670,000 SEK
Project Description: This study aims to evaluate a scalable intervention that can be implemented immediately after discharge from inpatient psychiatric care. The intervention, known as Caring Contacts, consists of a series of supportive text messages sent to patients without placing any demands on them. The goal is to determine if this intervention reduces suicide attempts within a year after discharge

Manne Sjöstrand
Type of grant: Project Grant
Project Title: Suicide Risk Assessments in Psychiatric Care: Clinical and Ethical Challenges
Grant Amount: 4,891,000 SEK

We are thrilled to announce that Christian Rück has been nominated for the August Prize in the non-fiction category for his book Ett liv värt att leva!

The August Prize is a Swedish literary award, presented annually by the Swedish Publishers’ Association since 1989.

Congratulations!

We invite you to join Psykiatri Sydväst’s Research and Development Day on November 5th, from 1:00 PM to 4:30 PM. This year’s theme is “Good Habits for Mental Health.”

The program will feature discussions on the importance of healthy lifestyle habits for mental well-being, poster presentations (including contributions from Rücklab members and others), and a panel discussion on the future and development of psychiatry.

The event will be held in Jan-Åke Gustafssonsalen at Campus Flemingsberg, Blickagången 16, Huddinge Hospital area. No pre-registration is needed—feel free to attend for the entire afternoon or drop by when it suits you.

Click here for more info and the full programme.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Take the time to hear Christian discuss suicidality from his perspective as a psychiatrist, professor, and author of his recent book Ett liv värt att leva (Albert Bonniers förlag, 2024) on the Swedish podcast Psykologsnack.

Here is a link to the episode – 108. Ett liv värt att leva? Med psykiatriprofessor Christian Rück.

We’re glad to welcome Julian Striegl to the research group as a new affiliated researcher. Julian is a research associate at ScaDS.AI (Center for Scalable Data Analytics and Artificial Intelligence) in Germany, where he works with conversational agents for ICBT, deep learning, and human-computer interaction, among other things. Julian will be joining our ongoing work on deep learning applied to genetics for suicide, predictive modelling after ICBT, and risk stratification after compulsive mental care in the statistical modelling team led by John Wallert.

Last week our modelling team led by John Wallert traveled to Cape Town, South Africa, for the World Congress of Epidemiology (WCE). We had three oral presentations and two poster presentations in psychiatric epidemiology!

Leoni Grossmann presented her work on: ”Suicide in the compulsory mental care population in Sweden: a descriptive nationwide registry study”.

Björn Bråstad presented his work on: ”Predictors of labour market marginalization in psychiatric patients following internet-delivered psychotherapy: a MULTI-PSYCH study with clinical, registry, and genetic data”.

And Fredrik Johansson presented his work on: ”Early change in individual depression symptoms and later symptom severity during internet-delivered cognitive behavioural therapy”. He also had two poster presentations.

The team was also accompanied by Head of Department of Statistics at Uppsala University, Ronnie Pingel, who is co-supervisor for Leoni. We also had time to socialise, enjoy the great sights, and delicious food! Both the WCE and Cape Town are strongly recommended!