Suicide Rate Among People With Depression Lower Than Previously Thought

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Suicide Rate Among People With Depression
Lower Than Previously Thought

Suicide rate among people with depression lower than previously thought Since a study published in 1970 reported that suicide in patients with affective illness incurred a lifetime risk of 15%, many papers and textbooks have uncritically cited this figure. Researchers from the Mayo Clinic, Minnesota, have published a new study in The American Journal of Psychiatry that refutes this commonly held notion. They point out that a 15% suicide rate can no longer be considered relevant because the definition of depression has changed since the 1970s. Today the diagnosis includes a greater number of people with mild or moderate symptoms who can be treated by medication or therapy.

Dr John Michael Bostwick and colleagues performed a meta-analysis of 100 suicide studies carried out over the past 30 years and found that two to nine percent was a more accurate suicide rate for patients with the condition. Dividing the data into three groups ? outpatients, inpatients, or suicidal inpatients ? they found that there was a hierarchy in suicide risk among the patients, based on their treatment history.

Patients who had recently been hospitalized for suicide, after a suicide attempt or with suicidal thoughts, were at the highest risk level of 6.8%. Those with depression who had been hospitalized for reasons other than suicide formed the next level at 4.1%. Outpatients treated for depression but who had not been admitted to hospital had a suicide risk of 2%. For the general population the risk is less than 0.5%.

Dr Bostwick commented: `Finding that hospitalized patients are at highest risk may seem like stating the obvious, but despite thousands of studies, almost no definitive risk factors have been found to tell us who is most likely to commit suicide.` He adds: `From the public health perspective, the study shows that most effective suicide prevention efforts should target recent or repeatedly hospitalized patients.`

http://www.psychiatrymatters.md/news/2000/week_50/day_3/p_0000049508.asp

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