Vulnerabilidade de mulheres que tentaram suicídio com medicamentos psicoativos

Abstract

Suicidal behavior has been considered a serious public health problem with complex causes and has been growing proportions all over the world with great social impact. In this context, the great participation of psychoactive drugs is prominent among the drugs used by women in suicidal attempts. Approaching this problem in a multidimensional way constitutes important tool for preventing and applying effective and specific actions for this population. Considering that the concept of vulnerability may contribute to this discussion, the present study focuses on the analysis of vulnerability contexts in the life of women who tried suicide using psychoactive drugs. This descriptive and exploratory study tries to delineate a series of cases using the analytical reference of vulnerability and home visit as data to be studied. Twenty women have been effectively investigated, ages over eighteen years old, whose cases were registered in the Intoxication Control Centre in the State University Hospital in Maringá (CCI/HUM) during the year 2010. The Notification Form, the Patient Form and a semi structured interview script were used for data source. The quantity data were inserted in the software Excel 2003 and analyzed in their relative and absolute frequency. Most women were white (15-75%), between 20 and 39 years old (11-55%) and married (12-60%). There was an average of educational years of 11.2. Depression was the most usual mental disorder (17-85%).The drugs used for suicide attempts were mostly the own women's drugs (18-90%) and stored in big quantity at their homes. Concerning family environment, thirteen women (65%) informed at least one type of mental disorder and six (30%) revealed suicide attempt history of at least one member in the family. In the case of ten women (50%), conflicts were constant with drug abuse in seven (35%) of the cases. Thirteen women had already been victims of violence, usually committed by their partners. The results lead us to the conclusion that women have low vulnerability to suicide attempts, but the stressing events inside their homes bring them high vulnerability to suicide attempt. The results in this study also suggest the professionals to act based on the fact that the patients are inserted in a social and familiar context, besides the biological factors. Giving strength and power for these women and their actions in these contexts could be efficient strategy for facing this problem.