Suicide mortality among adolescents in Brazil: increasing time trend between 2000 and 2015

ABSTRACT

Objectives:

Analyze the suicide mortality time trends among adolescents in Brazil from 2000 to 2015.

Methods:

Data were collected from the Brazilian Mortality Database and from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. Study variables were sex, year and underlying cause of death. The study included deaths from Intentional Self-Harm, X60-X84 – according to the 10th Revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10), of adolescents aged 10 to 19. The simple linear regression technique was used and results were considered statistically significant when p ≤ 5%.

Results:

From 2000 to 2015, there were 11,947 deaths due to suicide of adolescents in Brazil and 67% of these occurred in male adolescents, which corresponds to a 2,06:1 male-female ratio. There was a statistically significant increase in adolescent suicide mortality in Brazil (p = 0.016), which increased from 1.71 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2000 to 2.51 in 2015, a raise of 47%. The increase occurred in behalf of the increment in suicides of male adolescents (p = 0.001) specifically in the North (p < 0.001) and Northeast (p < 0.001) of Brazil. In regard to the female group, there was a downtrend of mortality by suicide in the Center West region (p = 0.039), but when it comes to Brazil as a whole, there was a stabilization behavior of mortality by suicide.

Conclusions:

These results indicate an increase in the suicide rate of adolescents in Brazil, particularly in the male population. The improvement of suicide prevention strategies in Brazil is imperative.

Keywords
Adolescent; suicide; regression analysis; Brazil