Abstract
Objectives
To compare 12-year suicide-specific mortalities of 3 different injury cohorts, identify
the risk factors for suicide mortality after spinal cord injury (SCI), and investigate
whether suicide mortality is higher among those with SCI than in the general population.
Design
Retrospective cohort study.
Setting
United States hospitals (n=28) designated as SCI Model Systems.
Participants
Participants (N=31,339) injured between January 1, 1973, and December 31, 1999.
Interventions
Not applicable.
Main Outcome Measure
Suicide death after SCI.
Results
The crude annual suicide mortality rate during the first 12 years after SCI was 91
per 100,000 person-years for 1973 to 1979 injury cohort, 69 per 100,000 person-years
for 1980 to 1989 injury cohort, and 46 per 100,000 person-years for 1990 to 1999 injury
cohort. Suicide mortality was associated with race, injury severity, and years since
injury. The standardized mortality ratios for the 3 cohorts were 5.2, 3.7, and 3.0,
respectively.
Conclusions
Suicide mortality among those with SCI decreased over 3 injury cohorts, but it still
remained 3 times higher than that of the general population.
Keywords
List of abbreviations:
AIS (American Spinal Injury Association Impairment Scale), NSCISC (National Spinal Cord Injury Statistical Center), SCI (spinal cord injury), SCIMS (Spinal Cord Injury Model Systems), SMR (standardized mortality ratio), U.S. (United States)To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: October 24, 2013
Footnotes
Supported by the Department of Education, National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (grant nos. H133B090005, H133A110002). However, the contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the Department of Education, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.
No commercial party having a direct financial interest in the results of the research supporting this article has conferred or will confer a benefit on the authors or on any organization with which the authors are associated.
Identification
Copyright
© 2014 American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
