Socioeconomic status and psychiatric comorbidity associated with suicidal behavior among a sample of Egyptian patients who attended Tanta University emergency hospital for suicide-related problems

Abstract

Background Many studies found association between psychosocial factors and suicidal behavior; this association differs from one community to another, and this difference could affect the risk assessment and the management of suicidal behavior. The aim of this work was to evaluate the role of socioeconomic, cultural, and psychosocial profile including psychiatric comorbidity on individuals with suicidal behavior who attended Tanta University emergency hospital. Results Family troubles were the commonest cause of suicidal behavior (28%), and drug overdose was the commonest method of attempt (38%). Positive correlation is between age and score of Beck scale for suicidal ideation (p = 0.000) which indicates that suicidal ideation increases with age. Significant association is between psychiatric comorbidity and Beck’s scale for suicidal ideation (p = 0.019), with size of association (η = 0.58). Regression analysis showed that older age, female sex, illiterates, widows, cases with psychiatric illness, and low socioeconomic status when act altogether are the significant predictor of suicidal ideation of our studied sample. Conclusions Our study demonstrated that studying psychosocial factors in individuals who came to emergency hospital of Tanta University could be a reflection of the community visiting this hospital asking for medical emergency service; the comprehensive and multifactorial assessment we have been adopted in this work could help in better understanding of the suicidal risk factors in this community and consequently help in part in tailoring the clinical service for this sector of patient.