Background Trending upwards, the US unintentional and violence-related injury mortality rate needed disaggregation. Aims/Objective/Purpose To analyse rate patterns and trends in total injury mortality and its five leading external causes. Methods An observational study using negative binomial regression to analyse annual cause-of-death data for US residents for the period 2000–2009 from the Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS). Results/Outcome The mortality rate declined by 25% for unintentional motor vehicle traffic crashes, and increased by 128%, 71%, and 15% for unintentional poisoning, unintentional falls, and suicide, respectively. Suicide is now the leading cause of injury mortality, followed by motor vehicle traffic crashes, poisoning, falls, and homicide, respectively. Females had a lower total injury mortality rate than males (0.39; 95% CI 0.38 to 0.40). Blacks (0.92; 95% CI 0.89 to 0.95) and Hispanics (0.86; 95% CI 0.84 to 0.89) had lower motor vehicular and suicide mortality rates (Blacks: 0.47; 95% CI 0.45 to 0.49) (Hispanics: 0.43; 95% CI 0.41 to 0.45) than Whites, and higher homicide rates (5.55; 95% CI 5.22 to 5.91) (1.92; 95% CI 1.80 to 2.05). The poisoning mortality rate showed a strong time trend; for example, 2009 vs 2000 (1.96; 95% CI 1.75 to 2.20). The fall mortality rate displayed a positive age gradient. Significance/Contribution to the Field Suicide, unintentional poisoning, and unintentional fall mortality pose major challenges for prevention in the USA. Suicide has become the leading cause of unintentional and violence-related or intentional injury mortality. Epitomised by successes in motor vehicle traffic safety, injury prevention needs to be evidence-based, proactive, multifaceted, integrated, systematic, flexible, ethically defensible, and sustained.
The mood stabilizing effects of lithium are well documented and there are numerous studies showing that lithium has anti-suicidal properties. In contrast to the daily dose usually administered in treatment of mood disorders, studies suggest that even doses at supplement level ingested via drinking water are associated with lower suicide rates of the corresponding population. Over the recent years this finding has sparked much interest among different research groups. Even though not all studies are equivocal, the findings are promising and further investigations of lithium's effects as a supplement are warranted. However, a substitution of drinking water with lithium cannot be recommended based on the existing ecological studies which can not by its nature prove causality.
IntroductionAssociations between psychiatric disorders and relationship status as well as the impact of psychiatric symptoms on the quality of romantic relationships have already been demonstrated but the association between psychiatric symptoms and the capacity to maintain romantic relationships has been rarely examined.AimTo investigate anxiety, depressive symptoms and capacity to love (CTL) in single women (sw) and those in a relationship (rw).MethodsTwo hundred healthy adult females (100 sw, 100 rw; mean age 27.8 ± 8.1 yrs and 27.3 ± 8.1 yrs, respectively) completed the PHQ-4 and the CTL-Inventory. Differences in anxiety and depressive symptoms and CTL between both groups were assessed by independent-samples t-tests. Moreover, correlations between CTL, anxiety and depressive symptoms in each group were investigated.ResultsSw showed a significantly higher level of depressive symptoms (meansw ± SDsw 1.5 9 ± 1.66, meanrw ± SDrw 1.07 ± 1.37, P = 0.016) and a significantly lower CTL (meansw ± SDsw 126.81 ± 12.60; meanrw ± SDrw 137.13 ± 11.26, P ≤ 0.001) than rw but no differences occurred for anxiety symptoms.Among sw, CTL negatively correlated with depressive (r = −0.37, P < 0.001) and anxiety symptoms (r = −0.44, P < 0.001) whereas in rw, a negative correlation occurred only between CTL and depressive symptoms (r = −0.43, P < 0.001).ConclusionOur results suggest that single women, compared to women in a relationship, show a lower CTL and suffer more from depressive symptoms.Furthermore, a lower CTL is associated with more anxiety and depressive symptoms, thus suggesting that future therapeutic approaches to depression and anxiety should also take into account relationship conflicts and CTL. As a crucial personality trait, CTL might be an important moderator of coping with common psychiatric symptoms.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.
IntroductionIt is known from previous studies that suicide follows a seasonal pattern with a peak in spring.ObjectivesAnalyze whether suicidal behavior is associated with the increase in the duration of sunshine in spring.AimsTo investigate the effect of number of sunshine hours per month on suicide rates in Austria between 1996–2006.MethodsSuicide data, differentiated by month of suicide, gender, and method of suicide (violent vs. non-violent methods), were provided by Statistics Austria. Data on the average number of sunshine hours per month were provided by the Austrian Central Institute for Meteorology. For statistical analysis ANOVA tests and Pearson correlation tests were used.ResultsSuicide frequencies were highest between March and May, lowest between November and January (df = 11, F = 5.2, p < .0001). The average number of sunshine hours per month was significantly correlated with the number of suicides among both genders r = .43 (p < .0001), violent methods (r = .48; p < .0001) but not with nonviolent methods (r = .03; p = .707).ConclusionsLight, possibly through interaction with melatonin, norepinephrine and serotonin, may improve motivation and drive first while mood improves at a later point in time. Thereby, a rapid increase in sunshine in spring might increase suicidal tendencies in vulnerable subjects.Fig. 1[Suicides and sunshine hours in Austria,1996-2006]
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