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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Dementia and suicidal behavior
— a review of the literature | | Author(s) | Camilla Haw, Daniel Harwood, Keith Hawton |
| Journal title | International Psychogeriatrics, vol 21, no 3, June 2009 |
| Pages | pp 440-453 |
| Keywords | Dementia ; Suicide ; Correlation ; Literature reviews. |
| Annotation | A search of the major relevant databases was carried out to examine the evidence for an association between dementia in older people and suicide rates among elderly population group. The association between dementia and suicide and also non-fatal self-harm did not appear, but many studies have significant methodological limitations; and there are few studies of suicide or self-harm in vascular, frontotemporal, Lewy body and HIV dementia where such behaviour might be expected to be more common. Rates of self-harm may be increased in mild dementia and are higher before the predictive testing for Huntington's disease. Overall, the risk of suicide in dementia appears to be the same or less than that of the age-matched general population but is increased soon after diagnosis, in patients diagnosed with dementia during hospitalisation and in Huntingdon's disease. Putative risk factors for suicide in dementia include depression, hopelessness, mild cognitive impairment, preserved insight, younger age and failure to respond to anti-dementia drugs. Large, good quality prospective studies are needed to confirm these findings. Further research should be undertaken to examine how rates of suicide and self-harm during the course of the illness also vary according to the specific sub-type of dementia. (KJ/RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-090616215 A |
| Classmark | EA: EV: 49: 64A |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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