Purpose: This study examined the levels of attitudes toward suicide, suicidal ideation, and suicidal behaviors in community-dwelling people with mental disorders and identified the correlations among those factors for providing practical data on suicide prevention and education for people with mental disorders.
Methods: The participants in the study consisted of 172 patients with mental disorders randomly selected from those hospitalized in or using 12 mental healthcare facilities located in J and C Provinces in Korea. The study employed the attitudes toward suicide (ATTS), scale for suicide ideation (SSI), and Columbia-severity rating scale (C-SSRS), while SPSS WIN 23.0 program was used for data analysis.
Results: Attitudes toward suicide based on participant characteristics was higher in the group of participants who were unmarried or were married but did not have a spouse, as compared to the group with a spouse. Suicidal ideation based on participant characteristics was higher among females than males in the group with a high school degree than the group with a college degree or higher, and in those with lower average income. Moreover, attitudes toward suicide attitude of community-dwelling people with mental disorders was positively correlated with suicidal ideation and suicidal behavior, while suicidal ideation showed statistically significant positive correlations with attitudes toward suicide attitude and suicidal behaviors.
Conclusion: The significance of this study was that it presents a foundation for future studies on suicide among people with mental disorders. Moreover, it is necessary to implement appropriate intervention measures by establishing plans that actively reinforce protective factors and systems for monitoring risk factors, and prevent suicide among people with mental disorders.