Ottilingam Somasundaram Ravindran1, Madras Sundararajan Jagadeesan2, Pannerselvam Thulasibai Gajalakshmi3, Ramasamy Balakrishnan4
BACKGROUND
Schizophrenia has been called a ‘Life-shortening disease’, because many sufferers die early than general population and suicide accounts for a significant proportion of those dying prematurely. Suicide attempts in schizophrenia has been an intriguing area of research work for mental health professionals. Indian research on suicide attempts in schizophrenia have been few.
OBJECTIVES
The objectives were to study the suicidal behaviour in schizophrenia, to compare and study the positive and negative symptoms, depressive symptoms, hopelessness and suicide intent in schizophrenic population with suicide attempt compared to non-attempters, along with socio-demographic parameters.
METHODS
A sample of 60 consecutive patients attending OPD of a Private tertiary care Hospital in Chennai were selected. Those who had a diagnosis of schizophrenia were screened for the presence of past suicide attempts. They were divided into two groups as suicide attempters and non-attempters, and analysed using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS), Calgary Depression Scale for Schizophrenia (CDSS), Beck’s hopelessness scale (BHS), and Suicide intent scale (SIS).
RESULTS
Among the disorders schizophrenia is rated the second most common reason for suicide attempts (53.3%), especially when associated with positive symptoms, depressive features and significant hopelessness. Demographic parameters like age, sex, educational status, occupation, economic status, and marital status were not found to be significant factors linked to the suicide attempts, however family history of suicide had a significant association in schizophrenic suicide attempts. Suicidal intent severity was medium to high among most of the attempters; poisoning was the commonest method; and were found to be due to positive symptoms and depressive symptoms in the schizophrenic illness course.
