BMJ 1995;311:56 (1 July)

Letters

Study's conclusion is unwarranted

EDITOR,--We believe that one of the key messages in the paper by John A Henry and colleagues is misleading: it states that "deaths from overdose can be prevented by switching prescribing from older, tricyclic drugs; such a move may contribute to government targets for reducing suicide."1 The same point is made in the last paragraph of the paper. The flaw is to equate the prevention of fatal poisoning with that of suicide in general. In the same issue Susan S Jick and colleagues found that of 143 suicides in Britain, only eight (6%) were due to antidepressant overdose.2 Similarly, in Sweden 190 (6%) of 3400 people who committed suicide had toxic blood antidepressant concentrations.3 The figure for England and Wales in 1990 was 7%. Thus the overwhelming majority of suicidal acts involve means other than an antidepressant overdose. Other things being equal, the strategy of prescribing newer, non-toxic antidepressants would . . . [Full text of this article]


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Relevant Article

Relative mortality from overdose of antidepressants
John A Henry, Carol A Alexander, and Ersin K Sener
BMJ 1995 310: 221-224. [Abstract] [Full Text]

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