Suicide is a
specific cause of death for mental disorders: up to 90% of completed suicide has
a history of a diagnosable mental disorder.
Prevention of suicide rests on early assessment
and diagnosis of those at risk, and the delivery of appropriate, effective
treatments.
A period of the year is linked to an enhanced risk
of suicide, with a higher risk in late spring Ð early summer in most countries.
A recent study
carried out by Dr Antonio Preti in collaboration with Professor Marco B.L.
Rocchi and Dr Davide Sisti, from the Institute of Biomathematics of the
University of Urbino, Italy, found that the suicides attributable to
psychiatric illness showed a significantly higher seasonal unevenness than the
suicides attributable to somatic illness, and to sentimental or economic
reasons.
Despite
limitations, the study clearly indicates that the dynamics of suicidal
behaviour is not unilinear: suicides due to psychiatric illness or to somatic
illness mainly happen in spring/summer and those due to economic difficulties
mainly in December.
The
spring/summer period, therefore, represents a window of higher risk of suicide
for the patients with psychiatric and/or somatic illness.
Reference:
Rocchi MBL,
Sisti D, Miotto P, Preti A
Seasonality of
suicide: Relationship with the reason for suicide.
Neuropsychobiology,
2007, 56: 86-92.
Contacts:
Dr Antonio
Preti
SchizophreniaProject
e-mail: apreti@tin.it