Suicidal attempts by jumping from heights. A three-year prospective study of patients admitted to an urban university accident department

Abstract

At the Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Helsinki University Central Hospital, an acute accident unit with more than 3,000 trauma admissions per year, a protocol was kept over the years 1982-84 of patients who were treated for injuries sustained from intentional falls from heights. The number of patients included in the series was 73. The mean age of the patients was 29.8 (range 15-65) years. The male:female ratio was 1.5:1. In 15 patients (21%) there was a previous history of recorded psychiatric disorder and in a further 11 patients (15%) chronic alcoholism. The 73 patients had a total of 164 serious individual injuries. Thirteen patients died, all except one within the first 24 hours. The median duration of the hospital stay at university department level was 49 days. In a follow-up survey one year after the fall, 19 (32% of the survivors) had returned to work, 29 (48%) were pensioned and 12 (20%) still needed institutional care. Eight had permanent complete paraplegia. The patients injured in suicidal falls amounted to 0.8% of all trauma admissions during the investigation period and to 3.3% of the nursing days. In the intensive care unit, however, these figures were 9.2% and 14.1% respectively, values high enough to warrant increasing attention to this kind of self-inflicted injuries.