Suicidal intent disclosure among adult suicide decedents: Four age group comparisons

Abstract

Research on who does/does not disclose suicidal intent (SI) and related factors has important implications for suicide risk management. In this paper based on the 2017–2019 National Violent Death Reporting System, we compared four age groups (18–24, 25–44, 45–64, and 65+ years) of suicide decedents with respect to associations between SI disclosure and (1) suicide contributing/precipitating factors, and (2) suicide means. The results shows that those age 18–44 were more likely to disclose SI than those age> =45, especially among those with relationship problems. Physical health problems and death/suicide of family/friend increased the likelihood of SI disclosure in the 65+ age group.

Acknowledgments

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) administers the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) in conjunction with participating NVDRS states. CDC provided the NVDRS Restricted Access Data used in this study to the authors. Study findings and conclusions are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily represent the official position of CDC or of the participating NVDRS states.

Author contributions

All three authors made substantial contributions and approved the final version. NGC and BYC did the literature review. NGC and CNM did statistical analyses. NGC and BYC drafted the paper, and all three edited the final version.

Additional information

Funding

The authors received support from the University of Texas at Austin’s internal research fund.