Several studies have shown that individuals with a parent who died by suicide have an increased risk of suicide or self-harm themselves compared with individuals with living parents or a parent who died from other causes. A study issued in Suicide and Life-Threatening Behaviors now finds that this risk may be particularly elevated when the individual reaches the same age at which the parent died by suicide.
“Contemporary models of grief acknowledge that individuals move backwards and forwards between phases or stages of grief rather than in a linear manner,” wrote Yanakan Logeswaran, M.Sc., of the University College of London Division of Psychiatry, and colleagues. “Our findings support the idea of a dynamic process of grief, in so much as the elevated risk of suicidal behavior at [parental] age correspondence might also represent a period of loss orientation and increased distress.”
Logeswaran and colleagues used national data from five Danish registries to identify individuals whose parents died between 1980 and 2016. The data included cause of death as well as hospital records of self-harm or suicide attempt. Individuals were separated into two groups: the 17,806 individuals whose parents died by suicide, and the 452,674 individuals whose parents died due to other causes. The researchers compared the risk of self-harm and suicide during the year before and after individuals reached the age of the deceased parent with the 15 years before and after that period.
Individuals reached the age of their deceased parent a median of 24 years after the loss. The researchers found that individuals whose parents died by suicide had about twice the risk of self-harm or suicide around the time they reached the age of the deceased parent relative to the 15 years before or after. Those whose parents died from other causes did not have an increased risk during this period of age correspondence
“Our findings support the practice of asking suicide-bereaved individuals about age at parental suicide, identifying this as an anticipated period of increased risk and planning increased support,” Logeswaran and colleagues wrote. “This is also an opportunity to reinforce that suicide is not inevitable after the suicide of a parent, with the absolute risk of suicide in offspring of suicide decedents estimated at less than 1%.”
For related information, see the Psychiatric News article “Nature, Nurture Both Contribute to Suicide Risk.”
(Image: Getty Images/iStock/Melissa Bornbach)
Don't miss out! To learn about newly posted articles in Psychiatric News, please sign up here.