Abstract

Background: Suicide is a major public health problem and top three causes of death among youth worldwide. As per WHO, almost around one million people die every year from suicide and almost twenty times more people attempt suicide. Place of Study: Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology at Gandhi Medical College, Musheerabad, Secunderabad, Hyderabad. Study Design: Hospital based cross-sectional study. Material and Method: The materials comprised 100 autopsy cases of suicidal deaths of females of 12 to 24 years ages, out of various autopsies done in our mortuary. Observation and Discussion: The highest numbers of cases were recorded in the 19-24 group i.e. 49 cases (49%). Hanging was the most commonly adopted method for committing suicide i.e. 53% of deaths. The other means adopted for committing suicide in the decreasing order of percentage of deaths are as follows: self-immolation 30% deaths, poisoning 13% deaths, drowning 2% deaths, and fall from height and railway injuries sharing 1% each. As per our findings, in 24% of the death cases, the motive behind the suicide is not known. Three times higher is the suicide death rate amongst women in India in comparison with the rate globally in terms of similar geographical levels of demography index, these highlights the specific needs to understand better the various determinants of suicides among women’s of India. Conclusion: Disproportionate high suicide rate amongst young females in south India is a public health crisis. A specific attention is required for suicides among young females in south India, as such suicide ranks and the lead cause of death amongst young adults in country.

• 1.   World Health Organization. Suicide rates per 100,000 by country, year and sex. [Last accessed on 2012 Mar 27]. Available from: http://www.who. int/mental_health/prevention/suicide_rates/en/ index.html.
• 2.   Suicide Statistics | Befrienders [Internet]. [Cited 2016 Nov 8]. Available from: http://www. befrienders.org/suicide-statistics.
• 3.   Suicide: An Indian perspective [Internet]. [Cited 2016 Nov 8]. Available from: https://www.ncbi. nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3554961/.
• 4.   Attitudes toward suicide among college students in South Korea and the United States [Internet]. [cited 2016 Nov 8]. Available from: https://www.ncbi. nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4025558/.
• 5.   Adolescents’ attitudes toward suicide, and a suicidal peer: a comparison between Swedish and Turkish high school students. – PubMed - NCBI [Internet]. [cited 2016 Nov 8]. Available from: https://www. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7644900.
• 6.   Arnautovska U, Grad OT. Attitudes towards Suicide in the Adolescent Population. Thesis.
• 7.   Ghasemi P, Shaghaghi A, Allahverdipour H. Measurement Scales of Suicidal Ideation and Attitudes: A Systematic Review Article. Health PromotPerspect. 2015 Oct 25;5:156–68.
• 8.   India Together: Where the young don’t want to live: ShambhuGhatak 19 July 2013 [Internet]. [cited 2016 Nov 11]. Available from: http://indiatogether.org/ suicide-society.
• 9.   Adolescent’s suicide attempts: populations at risk, vulnerability, and substance use. -PubMed - NCBI [Internet]. [cited 2016 Nov 11]. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ pubmed/14582573.
• 10.   Associations between suicidal high school students’ help-seeking and their attitudes and perceptions of social environment.-PubMed - NCBI [Internet]. [cited 2016 Nov Available from: https://www.ncbi. nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22562217.
• 11.   National Mental Health Survey of India – 2015- 2016. Available from: http://www.nimhans. ac.in/sites/default/files/u197/NMHS%20 Report%20%28Prevalence%20patterns%20and%20 outcomes%29%201.
• 12.   WHO. Preventing suicide: a global imperative. Geneva: World Health Organization, 2014.
• 13.   Mayer P. Suicide and society in India. New York: Routledge, 2012.
• 14.   Steen DM, Meyer P. Modernization and the malefemale suicide ratio in India 1967–1997: divergence or convergence? Suicide Life Threat Behav 2004;34: 147–59.
• 15.   Vijayakumar L. Suicide prevention: beyond mental disorder. Indian J Psychol Med. 2016;38:514–16.
• 16.   Patel V, Ramasundarahettige C, Vijayakumar L, et al. Suicide mortality in India: a nationally representative survey. Lancet. 2012;379:2343–51.
• 17.   Dandona R, Bertozzi-Villa A, Kumar GA, Dandona L. Lessons from a decade of suicide surveillance in India: who, why and how? Int J Epidemiol. 2017;46: 983–93.
• 18.   Arya V, Page A, River J, Armstrong G, Mayer P. Trends and socio-economic determinants of suicide in India: 2001–2013. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 2018;53:269–78.
• 19.   Vijayakumar L. Indian research on suicide. Indian J Psychiatry. 2010;52 (suppl 1):291–96.
• 20.   Vijayakumar L. Suicide in women. Indian J Psychiatry. 2015;57(suppl 2):233–38.
• 21.   Gururaj G, Isaac MK, Subbakrishna DK, Ranjani R. Risk factors for completed suicides: a case-control study from Bangalore, India. Inj Control Saf Promot 2004;11:183–91.
• 22.   Government of India. The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act. 2005. http:// n c w. ni c . i n / ac t s / T he P ro t e c t i o no f W o m en fromDomesticViolenceAct2005.pdf (accessed March 2, 2018).
• 23.   Weiyuan C. Women and suicide in rural China. Bull World Health Organ. 2009;87:888–89.
• 24.   Merriott D. Factors associated with the farmer suicide crisis in India. J Epidemiol Glob Health 2016;6:217–27.
• 25.   Mitra S. Are farmers’ suicides in India hyped to divert funds, attract attention? 2015. http://www.frstpost. com/politics/are-farmerssuicides-in-india-hypedto-divert-funds-attract-attention-2212908. Html (accessed March 3, 2018).