Citation

Praveen P, Kumar Dileep KB, Bheemappa H. Journal of South India Medicolegal Association 2018; 10(1): 1-4.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Adolescents constitute one of the precious resources of India characterized by growth and development and are a phase of vulnerability often influenced by several intrinsic and extrinsic factors that affect health and safety. Although adolescents make up about 20% of World's population, they have traditionally been neglected as distinct target group. Combination of developmental changes, risk-taking behavior and greater independence in this age group sometimes lead to undesirable consequences including death. Many cultural and socio-economic factors of a country are usually related to the causation of unnatural deaths. It is important to find out the origin and causes of adolescent deaths to guide health policies in preventing the unnatural deaths. Unintentional injury and suicide are leading causes of death among adolescents and reducing this is an important health priority as the people of this age are characterized by hope, drive and ambition. This particular section of the society is very much needed for the building the nation in future. There is limited data on adolescent mortality particularly from developing countries with unreliable death registration systems. This calls for the use of other sources of data to ascertain cause of adolescent mortality. The aim of this study is to investigate unnatural death among adolescents brought to Department of Forensic Medicine, Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute, Bengaluru. This helps in Understanding the causal pathway, elucidate potential areas for intervention and socio-political system to investigate and develop preventive measures. © 2018 South India Medico-Legal Association. All rights reserved.

Language: en

Keywords

Suicide; Unnatural deaths; Adolescent deaths; Fatal deliberate self harm