Suicide has attracted a wide interesti in research and prevention strategies. However suicide in the elderly remained a neglected area. The aim of this study is to review all identified cases of suicide in Birmingham and Solihull over five calendar years and provide a description of their epidemiological and social characteristics, their physical and psychiatric morbidity, level of involvement of the mental health services and primary care, methods of suicide, history and methods of previous attempts of deliberate self-harm, influence of alcohol, likelihood of confiding suicidal intention, legal aspects such as likelihood of attracting suicide verdict and causes of other associated deaths, seasonal distribution, and identified causes of stress in the period leading to suicide. This included a study of suicide notes left by the study subjects. The study also aims to comparce characteristics and attributes of suicide in older people and younger adults along the lines mentioned above. The main hypothesis is that there is no difference between suicide in older people and suicide in younger adults. The data source in this study was the coroner's files for inquests which took place between 1 January 1995 and 31d December 1999. All cases of suicide verdict and open verdict that died at or above the age of 18 were included. The study provided a descriptive analysis for the total group and a comparison between older people (65+) and younger adults (18-64). Conceptual qualitative analysis was carried out to study contents of suicide notes. This study shows that elderly suicides had different characteristics and attributes from those of the younger adults in most of the examined areas, however, conceptual analysis of suicide notes did not show any difference but the number was small. The author recommends that the difference between older people and younger adults should be considered in training for primary and secondary care staff and in suicide prevention programmes. The findings of this study also suggest that older people should be considered as a separate group in studying suicide in future research.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:403766 |
| Date | January 2004 |
| Creators | Tadros, George Mourice Yassa |
| Publisher | Keele University |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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