Forensic assessment of childhood maltreatment and its relation to suicidal ideation among some currently enrolled medical students in Cairo governorate in the academic year 2016/2017

Abstract

Background: Rate of suicide is in a sustained and marked increase from childhood to adulthood. A higher rate of nonlethal suicide attempts and even engagement in serious suicidal ideation is recently recorded. Since suicidal ideation is the first stage in the suicidal continuum, its discovery and assessment could definitely be of paramount importance in downsizing suicide prevalence among youth. Engaging in suicidal behavior can affect all strata of the society, though it has been reported that the socioeconomically stressed categories are the ones most affected. Given this potential hazard of suicidal behaviors, an expanding body of research has been performed to examine the risk factors implicated in these behaviors. One risk factor that has been the subject of significant study in the literature is child maltreatment Having said that, physicians, medical trainees and students in developing countries could be at potential risk of higher suicide rates than their peers of the general population. Aim: To assess the prevalence of childhood adverse events and their possible relation with suicidal ideation among medical students in Egypt. Methods: In this study, a total of 409 undergraduate medical students from Ain-shams university were assessed using online survey tool uploaded on survey monkey. The survey consisted of 4 parts: questions to obtain socio-demographic data, GHQ-12, a self-administered version of the Childhood Experience of Care and Abuse questionnaire (CECA-Q) and lastly the 19 items from the self-administered version of Beck's Scale for Suicidal Ideation scale(BSS). The study was completely blinded where all participants' emails and IP addresses were automatically omitted by the survey tool. Results: Suicidal Ideation was reported as a median of 0 (IQR=0-3) with a range of scores (0-25). 3.47% of suicide ideators reported previous actual attempts. As for psychological abuse, about 4.2% of the students reported mother antipathy whereas 11.55% of the students reported father antipathy. Moreover, 4.2% of the students reported mother neglect while 8.6% of the students reported father neglect. The results showed highly significant correlation between psychological abuse and the existence of suicidal thoughts. Physical abuse by both parents was recorded in about 42% of the population; however, no significant correlation was found with the existence of suicidal ideation. In contrast, sexual abuse was reported by 9.3% of the students and it was highly correlated to suicidal ideation. Regarding gender, females suffered more from father antipathy and recorded higher scores regarding suicidal ideation. Conclusion: This study delineated the shockingly high commonness of suicidal ideation among medical students in Egypt and casted the light on the close link between the formulation of suicide thoughts in our youth's minds and the past abusive events during their childhood.