TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2018//
TI  - Suicides between 2010 and 2014 in the German armed forces-comparison of suicide registry data and a German armed forces survey
JO  - Suicide and life-threatening behavior
A1  - Willmund, Gerd-Dieter
A1  - Heß, Julius
A1  - Helms, Christian
A1  - Wertenauer, Florian
A1  - Seiffert, Anja
A1  - Nolte, Almut
A1  - Wesemann, Ulrich
A1  - Zimmermann, Peter L.
SP  - ePub
EP  - ePub
VL  - ePub
IS  - ePub
N2  - BACKGROUND: The last 10 years have seen an increase in the number of suicides in the US Armed Forces. Accordingly, the topic of suicides in the German military has received a lot of attention in media and science alike. <br><br>METHODS: This study retrospectively examined all suicides (N = 107) committed by active, nonretired German military personnel from 2010 to the end of 2014, analyzing archived medical records. In a second step, these data were compared to a representative German Armed Forces survey conducted in 2012 (N = 1,549). <br><br>RESULTS: The following risk groups for suicide were identified: male (OR = 9.6), single (OR = 7.8), aged over 45 years (OR = 4.0), short period of service (<2 years; OR = 2.7), and low level of education (OR = 2.2). Surprisingly, military personnel with little experience in deployments abroad (<2 missions) showed double the risk (OR = 2.0) compared to those who had been deployed more than once. <br><br>DISCUSSION: Multiple robustness checks show that being single, aged over 45 years, and having obtained a low level of education exhibit the most robust effects on suicide risk. <br><br>CONCLUSION: Efforts should be made to develop and evaluate risk group-focused prevention programs. We conclude, that further studies should be initiated to show differences of risk groups between lethal and nonlethal suicidal behavior.<br><br>© 2018 The American Association of Suicidology.<p />  <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 0363-0234
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/sltb.12534
ID  - ref1
ER  -