HO PKO ET AL.BEHAVIOR AL ACTIVATION AND SUICIDE BEHAVIORAL ACTIVATION AND THE PREVENTION OF SUICIDAL BEHAVIORS IN PATIENTS WITH BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER

Clinical approaches in treating and preventing suicidal behaviors in pa-tientswith borderlinepersonalitydisorder (BPD) have received limited at-tention. To stimulate further work in this area, we present a behavioral activation treatment for depression (BATD; Lejuez, Hopko, & Hopko, 2002) that has shown promising results in treating clinically depressed patients and a theoretical conceptualization for why BATD may prove particularlyuseful in reducing the frequencyof suicide-relatedbehaviors and other symptoms characteristicof patients with BPD. We also present theoretical consistencies between BATD and the well-established inter-vention of dialectical behavior therapy (DBT; Linehan, 1993), which may allow for their practical integration, and conclude with a case study that illustrates the assimilation of these strategies in the treatment of a patient with BPD. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, 1998), suicide was the third leading cause of death for adults aged 15 to 44 years