A cross-cultural study of suicide intent in parasuicide patients

As part of the WHO/EURO Multicentre Study on Parasuicide, the level of suic ide intent among female and male parasuicide patients from various European regions was compared. From nine regions, a total of 1,212 parasuicide pati ents, 752 females and 460 males, were included ill the study. Although some statistical significant differences in level of suicide intent between the regions and genders were found, the effect sizes of these relationships we re so small that the differences have neither theoretical nor practical sig nificance. As far as level of suicide intent is concerned, the WHO study ha s succeeded in recruiting a relatively homogeneous group of self-harming pa tients across borders of region, culture, and country.