Socioeconomic Demographic Study of Suicide among the People in a Southern Town Berhampur of Odisha State (India)

Suicide is a worldwide problem affecting mostly the Asian countries like India. The aim of the present study was to specify the risk factors. The study was carried out on 434 established cases of suicide out of 1701 cases of all medico legal autopsies. Our study revealed a suicide rate 11.42 per 100,000 populations with male to female ratio 1.18:1. All the victims were Hindu with highest number reported between 21 to 30 years of age (34.33%). The victims were mostly illiterate (34.56%) of rural areas (74.19 %), low socioeconomic status (79.72%), mentally sound (86.4%), married (76%), and from nuclear families (51.84%), Housewives (30.65%) among female followed by laborers (25.81%) among male were the major sufferers. Family history of suicide, psychiatric illness, and physical illness, previous attempt of suicide, suicidal notes and hesitation cuts appear to be insignificant factors. Most of the incidents occurred in indoor (72.81%) during day time (59.22%) of summer (39.40%). A history of addiction was encountered in 37.33% cases. Two important methods of suicide were, poisoning (70.97%) with mostly ingestion of insecticide or pesticide (53.25%) followed by hanging (20.97%), where 81.32% of cases have used broad and soft ligature. The major causes of suicide were marital disharmony (22.98%) and financial burden (17.97%). Vitreous alcohol was positive in 20.33% victims. Victims belonging to blood group “O” were slightly prone to commit suicide. To conclude, our study points out some potential risk factors and their remedial measures.