THE INVESTIGATION OF THE USE OF EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES FOR GERIATRIC PATIENTS DUE TO SUICIDE

Abstract

Introduction: Ageing is a physiological process, and inevitable psychologicaland physical changes occur after the age of 65 in every individual. Elderly suicide isa crucial public health concern that is still largely ignored worldwide. The purposeof this study is to investigate the use of emergency medical services by geriatricpatients due to suicide.Materials and Method: We obtained the demographic and clinical informationof the patients from the records. We retrospectively examined the data of allpatients, who are 65 and older, enrolled in Turkey for the suicide attempt betweenSeptember 2018 and August 2019.Results: Our study included 769 cases. There was a statistically significantdifference between the two genders in terms of the number of completed suicides (p