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Abstract
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Between 1986 and 1999 the United States saw a 13 percent decrease in the rate of suicide (Paris, 2006); however, the rate has steadily increased since then and, as of 2013, continues to increase (Drapeau & McIntosh, 2015). The estimated number of completed suicides in the United States in 2013 totaled 41,149, which averages about one person every 12.8 minutes, making suicide the 10th leading cause of death in the United States (Drapeau & McIntosh, 2015).
Service Contact Prior to Suicide
Between 57 percent and 90 percent of individuals who die by suicide consulted their general practitioner in the year prior to death, with as many as 45 percent seeing a physician in the prior month (Luoma, Martin, & Pearson, 2002). A recent study by Ahmedani et al. (2014) likewise shows that not only do a majority of individuals have contact with health care professionals in the year prior to the suicide, but more than half obtained health services in the four weeks prior to the suicide. Similarly, Pearson et al. (2009) found that in the 247 completed suicides they reviewed, 224 had at least one face-to-face consultation in the year prior to their suicide. In addition, 91 percent of the 224 had their final consultation within six months prior to their suicide. Furthermore, results from a study reviewing 317 suicide cases showed that the number of contacts with physicians generally increased in frequency in the year preceding the suicide (Deisenhammer, Huber, Kemmler, Weiss, & Hinterhuber, 2007). Of note, individuals in the general …
Language: en |