Gender differences in suicide attempts: preliminary results of the multisite intervention study on suicidal behavior (SUPRE-MISS) from Campinas, Brazil

• Autor(a) principal: Stefanello,Sabrina
• Data de Publicação: 2008
• Outros Autores: Cais,Carlos Filinto da Silva, Mauro,Marisa Lúcia Fabrício, Freitas,Gisleine Vaz Scavacini de, Botega,Neury José
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Brazilian Journal of Psychiatry (São Paulo. 1999. Online)
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-44462008000200010
• topic: Suicide, attempted; Suicide; Gender; Primary prevention; Mental health

OBJECTIVE: To identify sociodemographic, psychosocial and clinical differences between men and women who attempted suicide and were seen at a university general hospital. METHOD: This is a non-controlled cross-sectional study, sub-project of the Multisite Intervention Study on Suicidal Behavior by the World Health Organization. A standardized interview that comprised psychometric scales was used. The comparison between genders was made by means of uni and multivariate logistic regression. RESULTS: 210 subjects (68.1% women) participated. Women had worse scores on the WHO Well-Being Index (p = 0.005), the Beck Depression Inventory (p = 0.01) and the Psychiatric Disability Assessment Schedule (p = 0.03). In the multivariate logistic regression, men presented more mental disorders due to alcohol and drug use (26.1% vs 7%, p = 0.02) and used alcohol at the suicide attempt more frequently (28.3% vs 16%, p = 0.03). Men reported that most of the time they had been feeling "active and vigorous" (50% vs 22%, p < 0.001). Women had had more physical and sexual abuse (27% vs 8.7%, p = 0.01). CONCLUSION: There are some distinctive characteristics between men and women who attempt suicide. Such differences may also be present in the general population and suggest there is a need for further studies, as well as the adoption of different strategies in suicide prevention for men and women.