Suicide rate of callers to a poison information service

The authors assessed the frequency of suicide subsequent to calls to a poison information center in a follow-up study. The 8 confirmed suicides out of 2,177 calls yielded a rate of 66.8 per 100,000 population--significantly higher than that for the general population. In addition, 15 possible or probable suicides were identified. The authors note that poison center callers seem to constitute a pool of significantly suicidal persons and reaffirm the premise that poison centers and suicide centers should coordinate their efforts.