The Annual Review of Suicide Cases of Kaohsiung City in 2013
Date Issued
2015
Date
2015
Author(s)
Su, Wen-Chi
Abstract
From the data published by the Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan, the crude suicide rate of Kaohsiung city in 2013 was 16.2 per 100,000 which was higher than the national average (12.0 per 100,000). Up to now, there is a paucity of study referred to the death investigations of suicide cases in Kaohsiung city.To investigate the characteristics of the demography and the circumstance of these cases, we collected the following information with de-linked for all 484 suicide cases (334 men and 150 women) in 2013 in Kaohsiung city, including gender, age, marital status, residence, residential state, condition of insurance, history of psychiatric disorders, history of substance abuse, previous suicidal behavior, suicide method, reason for suicide, occurrence site, time of death, completing forensic autopsy or not,leaving suicide note or not, and contents of suicide notes. Suicide cases in Kaohsiung city had the following characteristics:the sex ratio of suicide victims was 2.23 (male/female).There were higher proportion in people aged 65 or above (31.2 per 100,000), divorced population (56.0 per 100,000), people living with family (68.8%), the inhabitants of high and medium urbanization area(93.7%), suicide by hanging(31.8%), suicide for reasons of psychiatric illness(26.2%)and suicide at home(67.5%). 42.6% were insured, 40.3% were suffering from psychiatric illness, 12.6% were substance abusers,27.5% had previously attempted suicide.The total forensic autopsy rate was 12.0% in our study. The suicide cases arranged for forensic autopsy had the following characteristics: higher autopsy rate in the age group 15-24y/o(25.0%), living alone(15.9%), single(17.0%), substance abuser(19.7%), suicide by drowning(23.3%) and poisoning(20.0%) and suicide in water area(25.0%).The incidence of suicide note-leaving was 34.7% in our study. Suicide note writers in our study had the following characteristics: higher proportion in the age group 25-44 y/o (43.2%), suicide by charcoal-burning(51.3%), suicide for reasons of problem in interpersonal relationship(48.6%) and socioeconomic problem(41.2%). The contents of suicide notes included farewell to relatives and friends(62.4%), funeral arrangement(41.4%), financial arrangement(38.2%), tiredness(30.6%), self-blame(29.3%) and blame others for suicide(29.3%).From this study, we drawn the profiles of the suicide cases. We hope these results will give some help in death investigations of suicide cases and prevention of suicide in the future.
Subjects
Kaohsiung
Suicide
Forensic autopsy
Forensic autopsy rate
Suicide notes
Type
thesis
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