Recent developments: Suicide in older people

doi:10.1136/bmj.329.7471.895

BMJ 2004;329:895-899 (16 October), doi:10.1136/bmj.329.7471.895

Clinical review

Recent developments: Suicide in older people

Henry O'Connell, research fellow¹, Ai-Vyrn Chin, research fellow¹, Conal Cunningham, consultant¹, Brian A Lawlor, Conolly Norman professor of old age psychiatry¹

¹ Mercer's Institute for Research on Ageing, Hospital 4, St James's Hospital, Dublin 8, Republic of Ireland

Correspondence to: H O'Connell henryoconnell@hotmail.com

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Introduction

Elderly people have a higher risk of completed suicide thanany other age group worldwide.¹ Despite this, suicide in elderlypeople receives relatively little attention, with public healthmeasures, medical research, and media attention focusing onyounger age groups.² We outline the epidemiology and causalfactors associated with suicidal behaviour in elderly peopleand summarise the current measures for prevention and managementof this neglected phenomenon.

Sources and selection criteria

We searched Medline and the Cochrane database for original researchand review articles on suicide in elderly people using the searchterms "suicide", "elderly", and "older".

Dispelling the myths (Greek and otherwise)

From time immemorial, suicidal feelings and hopelessness havebeen considered part of ageing and understandable in the contextof being elderly and having physical disabilities. The AncientGreeks tolerated these attitudes in the extreme and gave elderlypeople the option of assisted suicide if they could plead convincinglythat they had no useful role in society. Such practices . . . [Full text of this article]

Epidemiology of suicidal behaviours

Factors associated with suicide in elderly people: re-examining the files of usual suspects

Detection

Management

CiteULike

Complore

Connotea

Del.icio.us Add to Digg

Digg

StumbleUpon Add to Technorati

Technorati What's this?

Relevant Articles

Screening may not reduce suicide in later life: Steve Iliffe and Jill Manthorpe
BMJ 2005 330: 43. [Extract] [Full Text]

Elderly people are at greater risk of suicide
BMJ 2004 329: 0. [Full Text]

Temporal relation between depression and cognitive impairment in old age: prospective population based study: David J Vinkers, Jacobijn Gussekloo, Max L Stek, Rudi G J Westendorp, and Roos C van der Mast
BMJ 2004 329: 881. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

This article has been cited by other articles:

Ku, Y.-C., Tsai, Y.-F., Lin, Y.-C., Lin, Y.-P. (2009). Suicide Experiences Among Institutionalized Older Veterans in Taiwan. The Gerontologist 49: 746-754 [Abstract] [Full text]
Purandare, N., Voshaar, R. C. O., Rodway, C., Bickley, H., Burns, A., Kapur, N. (2009). Suicide in dementia: 9-year national clinical survey in England and Wales. Br. J. Psychiatry 194: 175-180 [Abstract] [Full text]
Colgate, R., Jones, S. (2007). Controlling the confusion: management of referrals into mental health services for older adults. Adv. Psychiatr. Treat. 13: 317-324 [Abstract] [Full text]
Maki, N. E., Martikainen, P. T. (2007). Socioeconomic differences in suicide mortality by sex in Finland in 1971--2000: A register-based study of trends, levels, and life expectancy differences. Scand J Public Health 35: 387-395 [Abstract]
Vanlaere, L., Bouckaert, F., Gastmans, C. (2007). Care for suicidal older people: current clinical-ethical considerations. J. Med. Ethics 33: 376-381 [Abstract] [Full text]
Oyama, H., Fujita, M., Goto, M., Shibuya, H., Sakashita, T. (2006). Outcomes of Community-Based Screening for Depression and Suicide Prevention Among Japanese Elders. Gerontologist 46: 821-826 [Abstract] [Full text]
Williams, M. M., Clouse, R. E., Lustman, P. J. (2006). Treating Depression to Prevent Diabetes and Its Complications: Understanding Depression as a Medical Risk Factor. Clin. Diabetes 24: 79-86 [Abstract] [Full text]
Iliffe, S., Manthorpe, J. (2005). Screening may not reduce suicide in later life. BMJ 330: 43-43 [Full text]

Rapid Responses:

Read all Rapid Responses

Suicide is a preventable cause of death in older population?: Dr.Naseem A. Qureshi mD, IMAPA, LMIPS
bmj.com, 18 Oct 2004 [Full text]
Primary Prevention of Elderly Suicide: A.A.W. Amarasinghe, MD,
bmj.com, 19 Oct 2004 [Full text]
Suicide in later life: Steve Iliffe, et al.
bmj.com, 20 Oct 2004 [Full text]
Ageing does not increase suicide risk: Thomas J Verberne
bmj.com, 21 Oct 2004 [Full text]
What do you mean? I know what I am doing!: Dr. Herbert H. Nehrlich
bmj.com, 21 Oct 2004 [Full text]
Good news on late life suicide rates: John Snowdon
bmj.com, 17 Jan 2005 [Full text]