Suicides and fatal poisonings with other toxic substances: a trend analysis

Background: There is a general agreement that suicides are likely to be undercounted. In many countries the degree of undercounting of suicides is so great that it threatens the validity of research based on official statistics. Objective: In this article the trends in suicides and deaths classified as poisonings with other toxic substances were analyzed in Russia from 1956 to 2005 using time series analysis to evaluate the relationship between time series. Methods: To examine the relation between suicides and poisonings with other toxic substances trends across the study period a time series analysis was performed using the statistical package “Statistica 12.StatSoft”. Results: Between 1956 and 2005 the male suicide rate increased two times (from 296.3 to 598.8 per one million of population), while the rate of poisonings with other toxic substances increased 3.5 times (from 78.4 to 270.4 per one million of population). During the same period the female suicide rate increased by 24...