What Happens In Vegas? Place As A Risk Factor For Suicide

Every day 85 Americans die by suicide and hundreds of thousands more make attempts every year. The vast majority of recent studies on suicide have focused on identifying psychiatric risk factors. However, a new study by Temple University Sociology Professor Matt Wray explores time and place as factors in suicide by closely analyzing the patterns of suicide in a single geographic area—Las Vegas—over a 30 year period.

The results showed:

-- residents of Las Vegas face a suicide risk that is significantly higher than the risk faced by residents elsewhere

-- people who die while visiting Las Vegas are twice as likely to die by suicide than are people who die visiting someplace else

-- visitors to Las Vegas face an even higher suicide risk than residents of Las Vegas

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081111130839.htm