In a longitudinal cohort of street youth, 5% reported a suicide attempt; attempted suicide was most strongly associated with a history of physical abuse.
Mortality is very high among street youth, with suicide a leading cause of death. Understanding the elevated suicide risk in this population is important for developing prevention strategies. Using a longitudinal cohort of community-recruited street youth in Vancouver, Canada, investigators prospectively evaluated the risk for attempted suicide in relation to childhood maltreatment.
Eligibility requirements included age between 14 and 26, use of illicit drugs (other than marijuana) during the preceding month, and street involvement (i.e., homelessness or use of services for street-involved youth). At baseline, participants completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire to detect maltreatment in five categories: sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse, physical neglect, and emotional neglect. They also completed a questionnaire including the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression (CES-D) scale, with scores >21 indicating high levels of depressive symptoms.