NCJ Number
233631
Date Published
May 2010
Length
6 pages
Annotation
This report presets data on emergency department (ED) visits during 2008 that involved drug-related suicide attempts by young adults aged 18-24, as obtained from the Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), a public health surveillance system that monitors drug-related ED visits in the United States.
Abstract
In order to be included as a case in DAWN, the ED visit must have involved a drug, either as the direct cause of the visit or as a contributing factor. The DAWN data indicate that during 2008, 6.3 percent of drug-related ED visits made by young adults ages 18-24 involved suicide attempts. Females composed 57.6 percent of these cases. Pharmaceuticals were involved in 92.8 percent of drug-related suicide attempts among these cases. Alcohol, sometimes combined with other drugs, was involved in 3 out of 10 (30.3 percent) of the cases. Illicit drugs were involved in 21.9 percent of the cases, with marijuana (14.7 percent) and cocaine (6.2 percent) accounting for the largest proportions of the illicit substances. Of the cases of drug-related suicide attempts by young adults, 72.1 percent evidenced follow-up care. Approximately 4 in 10 ED visits associated with suicide attempts that involved alcohol and illicit drugs had no evidence of follow-up. Since EDs are a key access point to the health care system for people who have attempted suicide, they constitute a strategic point for timely intervention. The findings on follow-up care for these cases suggests the need for increased education and awareness among ED staff regarding the importance of follow-up care for all these cases of drug-related attempted suicide, regardless of the types of drugs involved. 1 table, 2 figures, and 8 notes