[Violent and non-violent methods of parasuicide: what determines the choice?]

Patients with violent methods of parasuicide share a number of common characteristics with those who complete suicide. They can be differentiated from patients with non-violent methods. Whereas surgery is usually the first-line care in cases of violent parasuicide, detoxification and/or psychiatric hospitalisation are first employed with non-violent parasuicide. Therefore it is important to know the specific needs and characteristics of both patient groups, as it may be hypothesised that patients with violent methods are at specifically high risk of committing suicide. As part of the WHO/EURO Multicentre Study on Parasuicide, we examined 120 cases of parasuicide in hospitals of the Bonn area with the instrument EPSIS 1. Violent and non-violent methods were differentiated following the WHO X-classification.

The following independent variables differentiate between violent and non-violent methods and predict the choice of violent methods: Diagnosis (schizophrenia vs. other diagnoses, p = 0.00027), gender (male, p = 0.04), high score of anger as a trait in State-Trait-Anger Scale (p = 0.017), poor mental health within the last 3 months (p = 0.058), time of parasuicide after 6 p.m. (p = 0.024). A higher number of previous parasuicides (p = 0.008) and unemployment (p = 0.047) were predictive of the choice of non-violent methods. A logistic regression analysis generated a model including the independent variables diagnosis, gender and "anger". Suicidal intent, sociodemographic variables, motives of parasuicides and "life events" did not discriminate between violent and non-violent methods.