Article Data

  • Views 2075
  • Dowloads 203

Original Research

Open Access Special Issue

Investigation of suicide deaths in Turkey between 2015 and 2019

  • Emrah Emiral1,*,
  • Gulsum Ozturk Emiral2
  • Zehra Arslan Cevik1
  • Nergis Canturk3
  • Gurol Canturk1

1Department of Forensic Medicine, Ankara University, School of Medicine, 06620 Ankara, Turkey

2Cankaya District Health Directorate, 06230 Ankara, Turkey

3Department of Criminalistics, Ankara University Institute of Forensic Sciences, 06620 Ankara, Turkey

DOI: 10.31083/jomh.2021.100 Vol.18,Issue 3,March 2022 pp.1-9

Submitted: 08 June 2021 Accepted: 09 August 2021

Published: 31 March 2022

*Corresponding Author(s): Emrah Emiral E-mail: emiral@ankara.edu.tr

Abstract

Background and objectives: Although suicide is the act of an individual, it is an important public health problem that affects the individual's environment and also society. Approximately 800,000 people die by suicide each year. In this study, we aimed to evaluate the socio-demographic characteristics of fatal suicides in Turkey between 2015 and 2019.

Materials and methods: This observational-analytical study was conducted by examining retrospec-tive records in the period 2015–2019. The study was conducted by secondary analysis based on data from the Turkish Statistical Institute.

Results: During the study period, the suicide rate (per 100,000) varied in the range 3.94–4.15 and the mean (standard deviation, SD) was 4.07 (0.09). The mean (SD) suicide rate was 6.14 (0.13) in males and 1.99 (0.18) in females; it was higher in males (z = 2.611; p = 0.008). Considering age groups, there was no difference between sex in terms of suicide rate among those aged <19 years (z = 1.617; p = 0.446), whereas the suicide rate was higher in males and in those aged ≥20 years (p < 0.05 for each). During the study period, the most common suicide mean in both men and women was "by hanging". The incidence of suicide using chemical substances and by jumping from a height was higher in women than in men, whereas the rate of suicide using firearms was high in men (p = 0.000). When the female/male suicide rate was compared according to marital status, the suicide rate was observed to be higher in men regardless of marital status, and this difference was more striking in men who were divorced or whose spouse had died.

Conclusion: Between 2015 and 2019, the suicide rate was higher especially in older men and in those who had lost a spouse. Therefore, socio-demographic characteristics should be considered in planning interventions to prevent suicides and guiding rehabilitation programs following a suicide attempt.

Keywords

Suicide; Sex; Turkey; TURKSTAT; Marital status; Education; Economic problems

Cite and Share

Emrah Emiral,Gulsum Ozturk Emiral,Zehra Arslan Cevik,Nergis Canturk,Gurol Canturk. Investigation of suicide deaths in Turkey between 2015 and 2019. Journal of Men's Health. 2022. 18(3);1-9.

References

[1] World Health Organization. Preventing Suicide: A Global Imperative. Geneva: WHO. 2014.

[2] Naghavi M. Global, regional, and national burden of suicide mortality 1990 to 2016: Systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016. British Medical Journal. 2019; 364: 1–11.

[3] Asirdizer M, Kartal E, Etli Y, Tatlisumak E, Gumus O, Hekimoglu Y, et al. The effect of altitude and climate on the suicide rates in Turkey. Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine. 2018; 54: 91–95.

[4] Asirdizer M, Yavuz MS, Aydin SD, Dizdar MG. Suicides in Turkey between 1996 and 2005: General perspective. American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology. 2010; 31: 138–145.

[5] Chen Y-Y, Chien-Chang Wu K, Yousuf S, Yip PS. Suicide in Asia: Opportunities and challenges. Epidemiologic Reviews. 2012; 34: 129–144.

[6] Devrimci-Ozguven H, Sayıl I. Suicide attempts in Turkey: Results of the WHO-EURO multicentre study on suicidal behaviour. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry. 2003; 48: 324–329.

[7] Hawton K, Van Heeringen K. International Handbook of Suicide and Attempted Suicide. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons. 2000.

[8] Kaplan J, Sadock M. Comprehensive textbook of psychiatry on CD-ROM. Tijdschrift voor Psychiatrie. 2003; 45: 12–22.

[9] Vijayakumar L. Suicide in women. Indian Journal of Psychiatry. 2015; 57: S233.

[10] Göktaş S, Metintaş S. Suicide mortality trends by age, gender and method in Turkey, 2002–2015. Turkish Journal of Public Health. 2019; 17: 195–206.

[11] Karbeyaz K, Çelikel A, Emiral E, Emiral GÖ. Elderly suicide in Eskisehir, Turkey. Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine. 2017; 52: 12–15.

[12] Naghavi M, Marczak LB, Kutz M, Shackelford KA, Arora M, Miller–Petrie M, et al. Global mortality from firearms, 1990–2016. Journal of the American Medical Association. 2018; 320: 792–814.

[13] Wu Y, Schwebel DC, Huang Y, Ning P, Cheng P, Hu G. Sex-specific and age-specific suicide mortality by method in 58 countries between 2000 and 2015. Injury Prevention. 2021; 27: 61–70.

[14] Oner S, Yenilmez C, Ozdamar K. Sex-related differences in methods of and reasons for suicide in Turkey between 1990 and 2010. Journal of International Medical Research. 2015; 43: 483–493.

[15] Turkish Statistical Institute. Address Based Population Registration System Results. 2020. Available at: https://data.tuik.gov.tr/Bulten/Index?p=Adrese-Dayali-Nufus-Kayit-Sistemi-Sonuclari-2020-37210 (Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[16] Turkish Statistical Institute. Statistics Data Portal. 2020. Avail-able at: https://data.tuik.gov.tr/Search/Search?text= intihar (Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[17] Turkish Statistical Institute. What job is to do? Available at: https: //www.tuik.gov.tr/Kurumsal/Sikca_Sorulan_Sorular

(Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[18] World Health Organization. Mental Health and Substance Use: Sui-cide Data. Available at: https://www.who.int/teams/mental-health-and-substance-use/suicide-data (Accessed: 12 Au-gust 2021).

[19] World Health Organization. Suicide Rates. 2019. Available at: https://apps.who.int/gho/data/node.sdg.3–4–data?lang=en (Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[20] Lester D. Suicide and Islam. Archives of Suicide Research. 2006; 10: 77–97.

[21] Gearing RE, Lizardi D. Religion and suicide. Journal of Religion and Health. 2009; 48: 332–341.

[22] Gal G, Goldberger N, Kabaha A, Haklai Z, Geraisy N, Gross R, et al. Suicidal behavior among muslim Arabs in Israel. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. 2012; 47: 11–17.

[23] Eskin M. Suicidal behavior in the mediterranean countries. Clinical Practice and Epidemiology in Mental Health. 2020; 16: 93.

[24] Qin P, Agerbo E, Westergård–Nielsen N, Eriksson T, Mortensen PB. Gender differences in risk factors for suicide in Denmark. British Journal of Psychiatry. 2000; 177: 546–550.

[25] Clarke CS, Bannon F, Denihan A. Suicide and religiosity: Masaryk’s theory revisited. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. 2003; 38: 502–506.

[26] Rossow I. Suicide, alcohol, and divorce: Aspects of gender and family integration. Addiction. 1993; 88: 1659–1665.

[27] Schrijvers DL, Bollen J, Sabbe BG. The gender paradox in suicidal behavior and its impact on the suicidal process. Journal of Affective Disorders. 2012; 138: 19–26.

[28] Denning DG, Conwell Y, King D, Cox C. Method choice, intent, and gender in completed suicide. Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior. 2000; 30: 282–288.

[29] Arsenault–Lapierre G, Kim C, Turecki G. Psychiatric diagnoses in 3275 suicides: A meta-analysis. BMC Psychiatry. 2004; 4: 1–11.

[30] Beautrais AL. Gender issues in youth suicidal behaviour. Emergency Medicine. 2002; 14: 35–42.

[31] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Suicide Prevention. 2021. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/facts/index. html (Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[32] Moneim WMA, Yassa HA, George SM. Suicide rate: Trends and implications in upper Egypt. Egyptian Journal of Forensic Sciences. 2011; 1: 48–52.

[33] ElHak SAG, El–Ghazali AM, Salama MM, Aboelyazeed AY. Fatal suicide cases in Port Said city. Egyptian Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine. 2009; 16: 266–268.

[34] Manders B, Kaur J. Suicides in the UK: 2018 Registrations. 2019. Available at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/suicidesintheunitedkingdom/2018registrations (Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[35] Varin M, Orpana HM, Palladino E, Pollock NJ, Baker MM. Trends in Suicide Mortality in Canada by Sex and Age Group, 1981 to 2017: A Population-Based Time Series Analysis: Tendances de la mortalité par suicide au Canada selon le sexe et le groupe d’âge, 1981–2017: Une analyse de séries chronologiques dans la population. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry. 2021; 66: 170–178.

[36] Martini M, da Fonseca RC, de Sousa MH, de Azambuja Farias C, de Azevedo Cardoso T, Kunz M, et al. Age and sex trends for suicide in Brazil between 2000 and 2016. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. 2019; 54: 857–860.

[37] Dyvesether SM, Nordentoft M, Forman JL, Erlangsen A. Joinpoint re-gression analysis of suicides in Denmark during 1980–2015. Methods. 2018; 65: A5477.

[38] Snowdon J, Saberi SM, Moazen–Zadeh E. A comparison between the age patterns and rates of suicide in the Islamic Republic of Iran and Australia. Eastern Mediterranean Health Journal. 2020; 26: 748–754.

[39] Ajilore OA, Kumar A. Suicide in late life. The Neurobiological Basis of Suicide (pp. 347). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press. 2012.

[40] Van Orden K, Conwell Y. Suicides in late life. Current Psychiatry Reports. 2011; 13: 234–241.

[41] Yoshioka E, Hanley S, Kawanishi Y, Saijo Y. Time trends in method-specific suicide rates in Japan, 1990–2011. Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences. 2016; 25: 58.

[42] World Health Organization. Suicide. 2019. Available at: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/suicide (Accessed: 1 August 2021).

[43] Presidential Legislation Information System of the Republic of Turkey. Biocidal Products Regulation. Available at: https://www.mevzuat.gov.tr/mevzuat?MevzuatNo=13672& MevzuatTur=7&MevzuatTertip=5 (Accessed: 1 June 2021).

[44] Yip PS, Caine E, Yousuf S, Chang S-S, Wu KC-C, Chen Y-Y. Means restriction for suicide prevention. Lancet. 2012; 379: 2393–2399.

[45] Griffiths C, Ladva G, Brock A, Baker A. Trends in suicide by marital status in England and Wales, 1982–2005. Health Statistics Quarterly. 2008; 8–14.

[46] Kyung–Sook W, SangSoo S, Sangjin S, Young-Jeon S. Marital status integration and suicide: A meta-analysis and meta–regression. Social Science & Medicine. 2018; 197: 116–126.

[47] Masocco M, Pompili M, Vanacore N, Innamorati M, Lester D, Girardi P, et al. Completed suicide and marital status according to the Italian region of origin. Psychiatric Quarterly. 2010; 81: 57–71.

[48] Duberstein PR, Conwell Y, Conner KR, Eberly S, Evinger JS, Caine ED. Poor social integration and suicide: fact or artifact? A case–control study. Psychological Medicine. 2004; 34: 1331.

[49] Zhang J, Li N, Tu X-M, Xiao S, Jia C. Risk factors for rural young suicide in China: A case-control study. Journal of Affective Disorders. 2011; 129: 244–251.

[50] Martiello MA, Boncompagni G, Lacangellera D, Corlito G. Risk factors for suicide in rural Italy: A case-control study. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. 2019; 54: 607–616.

[51] Alaräisänen A, Miettunen J, Lauronen E, Räsänen P, Isohanni M. Good school performance is a risk factor of suicide in psychoses: A 35‐year follow up of the Northern Finland 1966 Birth Cohort. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica. 2006; 114: 357–362.

[52] Lorant V, Kunst AE, Huisman M, Costa G, Mackenbach J. Socio-economic inequalities in suicide: A European comparative study. British Journal of Psychiatry. 2005; 187: 49–54.

[53] Rezaie L, Khazaie H, Soleimani A, Schwebel DC. Is self-immolation a distinct method for suicide? A comparison of Iranian patients attempting suicide by self-immolation and by poisoning. Burns. 2011; 37: 159–163.

[54] Shojaei A, Moradi S, Alaeddini F, Khodadoost M, Barzegar A, Khademi A. Association between suicide method, and gender, age, and education level in Iran over 2006–2010. Asia‐Pacific Psychiatry. 2014; 6: 18–22.

[55] Rocchi MB, Sisti D, Miotto P, Preti A. Seasonality of suicide: Relationship with the reason for suicide. Neuropsychobiology. 2007; 56: 86–92.

[56] Amiri B, Pourreza A, Rahimi Foroushani A, Hosseini SM, Poorolajal J. Suicide and associated risk factors in Hamadan province, west of Iran, in 2008 and 2009. Journal of Research in Health Sciences. 2012; 12: 88–92.

[57] Kim SH, Kim HJ, Oh SH, Cha K. Analysis of attempted suicide episodes presenting to the emergency department: Comparison of young, middle aged and older people. International Journal of Mental Health Systems. 2020; 14: 1–8.

Abstracted / indexed in

Science Citation Index Expanded (SciSearch) Created as SCI in 1964, Science Citation Index Expanded now indexes over 9,200 of the world’s most impactful journals across 178 scientific disciplines. More than 53 million records and 1.18 billion cited references date back from 1900 to present.

Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition aims to evaluate a journal’s value from multiple perspectives including the journal impact factor, descriptive data about a journal’s open access content as well as contributing authors, and provide readers a transparent and publisher-neutral data & statistics information about the journal.

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) DOAJ is a unique and extensive index of diverse open access journals from around the world, driven by a growing community, committed to ensuring quality content is freely available online for everyone.

SCImago The SCImago Journal & Country Rank is a publicly available portal that includes the journals and country scientific indicators developed from the information contained in the Scopus® database (Elsevier B.V.)

Publication Forum - JUFO (Federation of Finnish Learned Societies) Publication Forum is a classification of publication channels created by the Finnish scientific community to support the quality assessment of academic research.

Scopus: CiteScore 0.9 (2023) Scopus is Elsevier's abstract and citation database launched in 2004. Scopus covers nearly 36,377 titles (22,794 active titles and 13,583 Inactive titles) from approximately 11,678 publishers, of which 34,346 are peer-reviewed journals in top-level subject fields: life sciences, social sciences, physical sciences and health sciences.

Norwegian Register for Scientific Journals, Series and Publishers Search for publication channels (journals, series and publishers) in the Norwegian Register for Scientific Journals, Series and Publishers to see if they are considered as scientific. (https://kanalregister.hkdir.no/publiseringskanaler/Forside).

Submission Turnaround Time

Conferences

Top