Psychiatric co-Morbidity in deliberate self harm patient at rural medical college of South India

Introduction: Nearly one million people commit suicide worldwide every year (i.e. one suicide every 40 seconds) compared to approximately 400000 suicides every year, a decade earlier. Suicide is among the ten leading causes of death for all ages in most of the countries (WHO). Deliberate self harm is often associated with Psychiatric disorders influencing morbidity and mortality. Objective: To study the demographic profile and other related details like psychiatric co morbidity of attempted suicides. Material and Method: The current study is a cross sectional descriptive, inferential and hospital based study. The sample size was 94. A semi structured format was used to collect the information from both patient and the relatives. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual IV edition (DSM-IV) was used to categorize patients in to various groups of Psychiatric disorders, results were analyzed using SPSS Version 18. Chi square and Odds Ratio were used. Results: In this study Peak occurrence of suicides was in the age groups of 15-25 (51.06%) followed by 26-35 (29.78%), with Male preponderance of 60.63 %. Our Study finds 60 (63.82%) people having one or the other major psychiatric disorder according to DSM IV criteria. Among them 35 (58.33%) were males and 25(41.66%) were females. Common psychiatric disorders found were Alcohol and substance abuse among males and adjustment disorders and depression in females. Distribution of DSH patients with psychiatric co morbidity in different age groups showed strong skew towards younger age , with majority male patients 20 (57.14%) in the age group < 25 years. Conclusion: All DSH patients should be carefully evaluated for co morbid Psychiatric disorders. There is also an urgent need to sensitize all Emergency duty physicians about DSH with co morbid Psychiatric disorders.