Speechley M, Stavraky K M
Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Western Ontario, London, Canada.
Can J Public Health. 1991 Jan-Feb;82(1):38-42.
In spite of persistent criticisms regarding their validity, official suicide statistics continue to be used in epidemiologic studies that have substantial public health implications. We ask which epidemiologic findings might be affected by underreporting in the suicide rate. We estimate the extent of potential underreporting by comparing Canadian suicide rates with and without deaths of undetermined origin (UDs) added. Our results tend to confirm findings from other jurisdictions, specifically that underreporting is probably higher among females and cases of poisoning and drowning. The highest underreporting in the 1950-82 period was in 1977-1978. Overall, the average potential underreporting was found to be 17.5% for females and 12% for males. Still, underreporting is not sufficiently large that reasonable reformulations of the suicide rate substantially alter findings, suggesting that most epidemiologic conclusions based on official rates are essentially correct.
尽管对官方自杀统计数据的有效性存在持续批评，但这些数据仍继续用于具有重大公共卫生意义的流行病学研究中。我们探讨了自杀率漏报可能会影响哪些流行病学研究结果。通过比较纳入和未纳入不明原因死亡（UDs）的加拿大自杀率，我们估算了潜在漏报的程度。我们的研究结果倾向于证实其他司法管辖区的研究发现，特别是女性以及中毒和溺水案例的漏报率可能更高。1950 - 1982年期间漏报率最高的年份是1977 - 1978年。总体而言，发现女性的平均潜在漏报率为17.5%，男性为12%。不过，漏报率还没有高到对自杀率进行合理重新计算会大幅改变研究结果的程度，这表明基于官方数据得出的大多数流行病学结论基本正确。
