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A closer look at inpatient suicide
V Sharma1, E Persad, K Kueneman
1Department of Psychiatry, University of Western Ontario, London Psychiatric Hospital, Canada.
Background:
We examined the risk factors for suicide among inpatients in an Ontario provincial psychiatric hospital.
Methods:
Forty-four inpatients who had committed suicide during their hospital stay from 1969 to 1995 were compared with a group of inpatient controls matched for sex, age and date of admission. The diagnosis for each patient was reviewed by the authors.
Results:
Suicide victims were more likely to have had a mood disorder, family history of psychiatric problems, mention of suicide risk in chart notes and a previous suicide attempt. Two findings necessitated further scrutiny: The most common diagnosis among inpatients who committed suicide in this study was a mood disorder and not schizophrenia as previously reported. A large proportion of patients (24) had experienced a rapidly fluctuating clinical course prior to the time of suicide.
Conclusions:
The implications of these findings, including the possible role of antidepressants in the induction of cycling prior to suicide, are discussed.