Committed suicide: Forensic autopsy analysis at ramathibodi hospital during year 2001-2010

Abstract

Background: Suicide is one of the most important causes of death in the world. To study the behaviors and risk factors may be helpful to prevent suicide. Objective: To retrospectively study the factors that affected suicide in forensic postmortem cases at Ramathibodi Hospital, Bangkok, Thailand between 2001 and 2010. Material and Method: Two hundred ninety suicidal cases from 7,102 forensic postmortem autopsies in Ramathibodi Hospital between 2001 and 2010 were descriptively retrospective studied. Study topics included sex, age, nationality, year, methods of suicide, and HIV. Results: The suicide-rate in the present study varied between 2.53% and 6.91% (average 4.08%) of the forensic autopsy cases. The peak was found in 2003. Males had higher suicide rate than females [ratio of M:F of 4.3:1 (235 males and 55 females)]. The age varied from seven years to 91 years. Although the average age of suicide was 37.38 years, the peak was found in the young adult (age group of 21 to 30 years). Male, younger age, and foreigner were related to suicide with statistical significance. Hanging was the most frequent method of suicide followed by fall from height (62.1% and 17.2% respectively) and by firearm (in male) and toxic substance ingestion (in females). Of all the suicide, 5.1% were HIV seropositive, which is slightly more than non-HIV cases (4.0%) but this was not statistically significant. Conclusion: The suicidal cases among unusual death were related to varieties of factors. Male, younger age, and foreigner were significant related to suicide. Hanging and falling from height were the most frequent method of suicide.