Suicidal Behaviors Among Public Community Healthcare Center Registrants: A Comparison of Mental and General Healthcare Center Registrants in Korea
Kyuhong Lee, MD1 , Hoo Rim Song, MD, PhD1 , Su Young Lee, MD, PhD1 , Tae-Youn Jun, MD, PhD2 , Hae Kook Lee, MD, PhD3 , Jong-Hyun Jeong, MD, PhD4 , Sun-Jin Jo, PhD5
1Department of Psychiatry, Myongji Hospital, Hanyang University Medical Center, Goyang, 2Department of Psychiatry, Yeouido St. Mary’s Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul, 3Department of Psychiatry, Uijeongbu St. Mary’s Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea, Uijeongbu, 4Department of Psychiatry, St. Vincent’s Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea, Suwon, 5Department of Preventive Medicine, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul, Korea
Correspondence to: Hoo Rim Song, MD, PhD Department of Psychiatry, Myongji Hospital, Hanyang University Medical Center, 55 Hwasu-ro 14beon-gil, Deogyang-gu, Goyang 10475, Korea TEL +82-31-810-5114 FAX +82-31-969-0500 E-mail drsong@empas.com ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8927-0530
Received: October 1, 2020; Revised: October 22, 2020; Accepted: October 22, 2020; Published online: November 30, 2020.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
Background: The study examined the prevalence of suicidal ideation and suicide attempts among registrants of public community healthcare centers and compared between the characteristics of mental and general healthcare center (GHC) registrants. Methods: The study measured lifetime suicidal behaviors, psychosocial variables, psychiatric comorbidities, and suicide related factors. Results: A total of 132 (73.7%) and 126 (42.3%) mental and GHC registrants, respectively, reported a history of suicidal ideation; whereas 64 (35.8%) and 29 (9.7%) of mental and GHC registrants, respectively, reported a history of suicidal attempts. Scores of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) for both suicidal ideation groups were above the severe level, although only 2% of GHC group recognized their diagnoses of depressive disorders. Conclusion: The study observed high suicidal risk among the mental and GHC registrants. High BDI scores and unevaluated depression under score the need for screening and provision of appropriate early interventions in public community healthcare centers.
Keywords: Suicide; Depression; Public community healthcare center
, Hoo Rim Song, MD, PhD1 
Funding Information
Ministry of Health and Welfare
