Suicide in the Elderly – The Hastening of Death

Introduction: Suicidal thoughts are common amongst the elderly. The risk of suicide in people aged 65 or more is the highest in several countries. The lethality of suicide attempts increases with age and the risk of acting on suicidal thoughts is higher. Many are the risk factors that seem to lead to suicidal ideation in this age. Aims: The present review aims to study the characteristics, risk factors and prevention programs concerning elderly suicide. It also aims to raise awareness amongst health care workers for this issue. Methods: A literature review was carried out using the Pubmed with the keywords “elderly”, “aging” and “suicide”. Reference of United Nation’s reports and a textbook were also considered. Results: Suicide in the elder seems to be multifactorial . 46 to 86% of older people who die of suicide presented an affective affective disorder in the previous weeks, namely, depression. Other risk factors are anxiety, male gender, higher education, obsessive personality traits, poor social integration in society, adverse life events, especially the death of the spouse, medical condition and neurocognitive dysfunction. Conclusions: Suicide prevention programs for the elder should not focus only on depression but in all the factors abovementioned, promoting the development of the subject’s resilience, positive aging, family and society involvement and also the control of medical comorbidities.