Further Suicidal Behaviour: The Development and Validation of Predictive Scales

Despite the increased understanding of the motivation behind acts of attempted suicide (e.g. Stengel and Cook, 1958) and their personal, social and ecological correlates (McCulloch, 1965; Kessel, 1965; Philip and McCulloch, 1966) the incidence of such acts as reflected in admission to hospital continues to rise. A comparison of admissions for the City of Edinburgh in 1962-3 and 1967 (Aitken, et al., 1969) showed a striking increase for men from 108.5 per 100,000 in the earlier year to 181.5 in 1967. The corresponding figures for women were 166.3 to 210.0. The Regional Poisoning Treatment Centre at the Royal Infirmary treats about 90 per cent of all cases of attempted suicide admitted to hospitals in the area (Kessel, et al., 1964), and the increase is unlikely to be accounted for by redirection of patients from other hospitals. An increase has also been demonstrated in other parts of Britain, including the Oxford Region (Evans, 1967) and Cardiff (Graham and Hitchens, 1967).