Abstract
To identify the demographic and clinical characteristics associated with access to Emergency Departments for Suicide Attempt in a cohort of patients with Gambling disorders. We used electronic health records of inpatient and outpatient services to identify individuals who received a diagnosis of gambling disorder (ICD-9 or ICD-10 codes) in the Metropolitan area of Bologna from 2009 to 2019. In this cohort we identified accesses to Emergency Departments for suicide attempt through cross-matching with electronic records. We calculated Crude Suicide Attempt Rates; we also included the demographic-clinical variables in a multivariate Poisson regression. We identified 692 patients with a diagnosis of gambling disorder and a total of 2733 Person Years. The Crude Suicide Attempt Rate per 1000 Person Years was 9.17 (95% CI 6.20–13.58), higher for females and much higher than the general population (incidence rate ratio = 93.72). The multivariate analysis showed a higher risk of suicide attempt in the year following the first contact with a clinical service, in patients younger than 45 years, with alcohol use disorders and personality disorders. This study evidenced a high risk of access to Emergency Departments for suicide attempt in individuals with a diagnosis of gambling disorder and highlighted important demographic and clinical factors that should be considered when evaluating suicide risk in this population.
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Acknowledgements
We are very grateful to Elsa Turino, Epidemiological Monitoring Center on Addiction, Department of Mental Health and Pathological Addictions, Local Health Unit of Bologna, Italy for their help in collecting data.
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Pavarin, R.M., Fabbri, C., Fioritti, A. et al. Gambling Disorder in an Italian Population: Risk of Suicide Attempts and Associated Demographic-Clinical Factors using Electronic Health Records. J Gambl Stud 38, 1143–1156 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10899-021-10088-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10899-021-10088-1