Epidemiology and Nature of Suicide Attempts in Children and Adolescents at the Tertiary Care Pediatric Hospitals; a Multicentre Retrospective Study in Turkey

Abstract

Introduction: Suicide and suicide attempts are among the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in the youth population worldwide, with drastically increased rates over the past years. Objectives: We aimed to investigate the major risk factors, sociodemographic characteristics, and prevalence of psychiatric comorbidities in children that hospitalized in pediatric intensive care units (PICUs) for selfpoisoning suicide attempts through drug overdose. Methods: We performed a descriptive, cross-sectional retrospective study, including all the cases of suicide attempts that hospitalized at pediatric intensive care unit between January 2015 and December 2020. Results: In the study period, 356 children of self-poisoning suicide occurred, 20 cases were excluded from the study. The mean age of the study population was 14.98 ± 1.53 years. Seventy (20.8%) children were within 10-13 years with the predominance of female gender (female/male sex ratio: 3.35/1). Suicidal attempts were more common in females (p = 0.001). Considering the nature of attempt, toxic drug overdose (95.5%) appeared as the most frequent method of suicide, followed by intake of pesticides (4.5%). Antipyretics and antidepressants were the common pharmaceuticals involved in drug toxicity (21%, 19.3%). Conclusions: The present results showed that the majority of suicide attempts occurred during adolescence, with an increase in pre-adolescence at a considerable rate. Overall, it is important to increase the knowledge of pediatricians about suicide attempts in children and provide psychosocial support for children and their families as a preventive measure after their first attempt.