[Suicide in female and male physicians]

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether there are gender differences in the incidence of suicide in physicians, and whether there are differences in the methods used by male and female physicians to commit suicide. DESIGN: Systematic literature search. METHOD: A literature search was performed in the electronic literature databases PubMed and PsycInfo. After exclusion based on title, abstract or missing data, 9 studies remained. All these studies met quality criteria that were set up in advance. The studies were assessed by 2 researchers. RESULTS: Suicide among male physicians occurred at the same or at a slightly lower rate, than in the general population. Even after correction for age, female physicians committed suicide more often. The gender difference in suicide in the general population, i.e. suicide attempts by men are more successful than those by women, was not found in physicians. Male and female physicians often used medication as their preferred method of suicide, and at twice the rate that people in the general population did. CONCLUSION: Female physicians are at higher risk of committing suicide than their male counterparts, although this situation is perhaps changing now that they are less of a minority. With respect to prevention, one might consider paying more attention to depression in physicians and those in training, and to constructing a more open professional culture in which mistakes are condemned less