[Analysis of negative life events among 304 elderly suicide victims].
OBJECTIVE
To identify the most common life events that occurred prior to suicide in elderly individuals and the relationship of these life events to depressive symptoms.


METHODS
A detailed study considering life events in the year prior to death, the presence of mental illness at the time of death and the level of depressive symptoms in the 2 weeks prior to death was undertaken with the family members and other associates of 304 persons at 55 years of age and older who died of suicide.


RESULTS
The three most common negative life events were acute or chronic physical illness or injury (59.2%), major changes in diet, sleeping or other daily routines (37.8%) and financial difficulties (34.5%). The severity of depressive symptoms was significantly greater among persons who had experienced these life events both for persons with or without definite mental illness.


CONCLUSIONS
Most elderly persons who died of suicide events had experienced multiple negative life events in the year prior to death and these life events were closely related to the severity of depressive symptoms at the time of death.
Zhou
Mai-geng
MG
National Center for Chronic and Noncommunicable Disease Prevention and Control, Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing 100050, China.
Zhang
Yan-ping
YP
Wang
Li-jun
LJ
Huang
Zheng-jing
ZJ
Phillips
Michael R
MR
Yang
Gong-huan
GH
D000368:Aged / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D002681:China; D003863:Depression / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D008016:Life Change Events; D011788:Quality of Life; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D013405:Suicide / Q000523:psychology*