Depression is not a necessary precondition for suicide, but it is clear that depressed patients are at higher risk for this behavior. So does depression and suicide correlate. According to Rudd, Corderom and Bryan, causality is not demonstrated between a reduction in antidepressants use and an observed increase in suicide rates. In order to argue the case of a direct relationship between antidepressants prescriptions and suicide, three factors must be considered.
1. an association between use of antidepressants and a decline in suicide rates
2. an association between the use of antidepressants and an increas in suicide rates
3. the overall incidence of suicide in a given population
After the introduction of antidrepressants such as fluoxetine and other serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SRIs) a decline in overall suicide rates has been observed,but direct casuality cannot be imputed.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data for suicide is, age adjusted suicide rates per 100,000 (for all ages) were 12.5 in 1990 and 10.9 in 2005. Declines for adolescents ages 15-24 years also dropped from 12.3/100,000 in 1980 to below 12/100,000 in 1996 and then in 2003, 9.7/100,000.
Other factors could have influenced in the decline of suicides such as, the presence or absence of suicide education and prevention programs, the availability of mental health services, and better data collection mechanisms for reporting suicides.
A very important factor that arose in 2004 was the black box warning which resulted from an increase in reported suicidal behavior among children and adolescents taking antidepressants.
(Morgan T Sammons, 2009,Professional Psychology: Research and Practice 2009, Vol 40 rptd in American Psychological Association)
How often if ever do you read the labels of your medications whether it’s an over-the-counter drug or a prescription drug? If you don’t read the labels don’t feel alone most people just read the dosage on the bottles and some don’t even do that the doctor might say take one pill once a day and that’s what they do regardless of what the bottle says. The problem is more and more people are taking medications for some reason or another, and not even looking at what the side effects are much less what can happen if you mix them. Suicide is the 11th leading cause of death in Americans; there are many risk factors that can put a person at risk for suicide. Among the many risk factors the number one is depression and mental illness. Interestingly a lot of the victims of suicide are already being medically treated.
I have always thought that certain drugs can alter behavior/mental status which could potentially lead to suicidal thoughts/suicide. It would be awesome if we could provide research
ReplyDeleteThis posts has a lot of big words/lengthy sentences which makes it a little heard to read. I think the facts are important, but to present them in a clearer way would be a little better.
This is a very controversial and complicated debate. I've always felt that the criteria for assessing and diagnosing depression are questionable, to say the least, and that drugs are vastly overprescribed to the youth. Establishing causation when dealing with individual brain chemistry can be extremely difficult to prove, but the association is important. I thik it's a given that there are a multitude of factors influencing suicide, but the influence of mood-altering drugs more than likely does give some people the idea or release of inhibitions to actually commit suicide.
ReplyDeleteI think that people who show signs of depression have emotional problems as it is and taking a drug to hopefully help it but in turn does not it just gives the person more reason to do something like commiting suicide. Although in the past they might not have gone that far as to kill themselves the drugs are per say the staw that brakes the camels back.
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