Adolescent Depression and Suicide

In the United States, suicide is the third-leading cause of death for 10 to 14-year-olds (CDC, 2015) and for 15 to 19-year-olds (Friedman, 2008). In 2013, 17.0% of students grades 9 to 12 in the United States seriously thought about committing suicide; 13.6% made a suicide plan; 8.0% attempted suicide; and 2.7% attempted suicide in which required medical attention (CDC, 2015). These alarming statistics show that there is something wrong with the way suicide is handled in today’s society. In order to alleviate the devastating consequences of teenage suicide, it is important to get at the root of what causes it all: mental illness. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Protection (2013), mental illness is the imbalance of thinking, state of mind, and mood. Approximately 90% of all suicides are committed by people with mental illnesses (NAMI, n.d.). This shows that there is a correlation between mental illness and suicide. If mental illnesses are not treated, deadly consequences could occur. It would make sense that if there is a correlation between mental illness and suicide across all ages, the same should be thought for adolescents. Approximately 21% of all teenagers have a treatable mental illness (Friedman, 2008), although 60% do not receive the help that they need (Horowitz, Ballard, & Pao, 2009). If mental illnesses are not found and treated in teenagers, some of them may pay the ultimate price.

However, suicide can be prevented with early diagnosis, intervention, and treatment. Since suicide ideators and attempters often experience hopelessness, maintaining positive relationships among families, peers, and communities will enhance youth's health and well-being. Interventions such as school-based suicide prevention program and family-oriented therapy may help adolescents overcome their suicidal behavior and ideation. Nurses must know the signs and symptoms of depression in adolescents and serve as an advocate for

Mental illness is a popular ill among all ages of people, it can happen in kids, adult or in senior. In fact, 20% of Canadians will personally experience in their lifetime (Canada Mental Health Association, n.d.). But all among of those mental illness we’re going to talk about depression. Depression is an extremely complex disease and it can be really bad especially for people who are expected to focus during class, be confident and social outside of school, and successfully plan their futures, depression it can be devastating for these people. Even mental experts have a belief that’s teens suffering from untreated depression are up to 12 times more likely to commit suicide (Marsico, 2012, p16). The main purpose of making this report is to

Teen suicide is one of the largest problems facing America at the moment, and it will only become worse if the country does not come up with a solution. “According to the American Psychiatric Association, suicide is the third leading cause of death for young people between eleven and eighteen years of age (Teen Suicide).” American families can not keep losing sons and daughters to this entirely preventable epidemic. The largest issue with teen suicide is that Americans are using largely outdated and/or ineffective strategies in dealing with teen suicide, and Americans need to realize that this problem will not just go away. Using the old methods, such as telling teens to toughen up, are clearly not working and in some cases are contributing to the problem. Teen suicide is alarmingly on the rise and “According to the CDC, 5,504 people ages 10 to 24 died by suicide in 2014, the most recent year in which statistics are available. The figure was up from the grim 2013 tally of 5,264, and the number has risen every year and up 13 percent from 2010 (Corbin).” There are several causes for teen suicide that range from depression to concussions, and for each cause there are several proposed solutions to suicide or its causes, but many of the solutions will cause more problems instead of solving current ones, Americans need to utilize effective suicide prevention strategies and ignore the useless and outdated ones.

Suicide is reaching epidemic proportions all across the globe. What is causing such an outbreak in young adults? Most people have heard about the get help hotlines and the advertisements associated with suicide. Although we 've all heard about it, not much is being done about it. Johnson states the facts about suicide, “claiming 39,518 lives in 2011, or more than 6,889 more than in 2005” (10). This small piece of information goes to show just how much suicide has increased in the last few years. Besides being the number 10 cause of death among all ages in the U.S., it is the 2nd leading killer of adolescents, or “people between ages 15 and 19” (Peacock 1). Also, the number of completed suicides only touches the surface on the dilemma it truly is; this is because there are 25 suicide attempts per every suicide (731). What goes unnoticed is that suicide is on the rise for a number of reasons including mental illness, bullying, social media, and high expectation perfectionist teens.

Although most of the media attention focuses on adolescent homicide, suicide deaths should have us more alarmed, and we should understand that adolescent suicide is a preventable public health issue. In adolescent Suicide deaths are more prevalent than homicide deaths (CDC, 2012). According to the National Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS), suicide is the second leading cause of death for adolescents age 13 to 17 (CDC, 2016). That number surpasses the number of deaths due to chronic diseases such as cancer, HIV, and diabetes. While this is a significant number, not all suicide attempts are reported (Joiner, 2005). Furthermore, suicide accounted for 10 % of

Day to day, teens suffer from peer pressure, problem from home, and stress from academics. Despise their status in the environment, majority of high school students refrain from acknowledging the presence of their reality. The problem in most situations in that students feel shut in, trapped in a never ending misery. How do they cope? What are their ways of dealing? Most students live in denial. Others have friends to confide in. For the devastating part, most students are not as open to these ideas and it leaves them with this alternative: suicide. Suicide is the third leading cause in teens the ages 14 to 19 within rural underserved areas. Suicidal ideation (SI), suicidal thoughts, were surveyed in over 12 high schools and it was found that in the past year, thoughts of (SI) were not shared with peers or even adults in the pursuit of receiving help or support (Pisani, 2012). Because a student spends most of their day at school, it is ideal for schools to provide realistic opportunities and school-based programs to assist with the suicide among the youth. The Surviving the Teens Suicide Prevention and Depression Awareness Program designed four 50 minute session or each high school student. This presented information in regards to factual information about depression, suicidal warning signs, suicidal risk factors and myths associated with suicide (King, 2010). The program provide coping strategies for everyday life, referral sources if feeling suicidal, and how to recognize

Did you know that there are more deaths by suicide than homicide in the United States? There are ninety-four people that die everyday from suicide, and another one million people attempt suicide in the United States everyday (“Suicide in…”). In the 1980s and the 1990s, the amount of suicides were heading in the right direction--they were decreasing. “It had been decreasing steadily since 1986, and then what happened is there was a turnaround,” says Sally Curtin (Bichell). In order to prevent teenage suicide, individuals should be aware of the reasons why teenagers commit suicide as well as how to identify the warning signs, and they should understand the affects of suicide on others and how to cope with depression and stress.

According to E.J. Holt, in Adolescent Suicide: Identifying Risk Factors, a magazine article. 63% of Midwestern High School students reported that students, have some sort of suicide ideation or behavior, over the last 30 years show that the suicide rates among adolescents between the ages 15 and 24 years old has increased over 200%. An important aspect of adolescent suicide is that it invariably takes place at the time of a crisis such as the break-up of a relationship, problems at school or home, or a humiliating experience. There is no actual means for identifying the reason behind adolescent suicides, there are warning symptoms, to help parents, teachers and others in making such an identification, such as change in eating and sleeping

According to data provided by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) suicide was the tenth leading cause of death for all ages in 2013. There were 41,149 successful suicides in the United States. Available data regarding completed suicides in 16 National Violent Death Reporting System states in 2010, 33.4% of suicide decedents tested positive for alcohol, 23.8% for antidepressant medication, and 20.0 % for opiates, including heroin and prescription pain killers, Suicide is the third leading cause of death among persons aged 10-14, resulting in 4,500 adolescent deaths in 2010. In addition, among students in grades nine to twelve during 2013, 17.0% of students seriously considered attempting suicide in the previous twelve months. Adolescent suicide represents an important health crisis, and “researchers are tasked with identifying the characteristics and causes of adolescent suicidal behavior, with the aim of developing and refining suicide prevention programs” (Grover et al. 2009). Data implies that illicit and prescription drugs and alcohol are involved with a majority of completed suicide attempts; in what way does depressive symptoms in adolescents effect suicidal behavior?

Discussions on current research regarding adolescent attempts at suicide and examples from J.D.’s experience with this issue show how and why defective reasoning lends itself to poor decision-making and maladaptive behavior. This paper examined adolescent suicide attempts in relation to intellect, beliefs, shortfalls in emergent activity switching, coping styles, personality, thinking dispositions, and improper acquisition and use of tacit knowledge (Sternberg, 2002). Incorrect expressions of these structures pose an increased risk for maladaptation that can intensify risks for attempted suicide in adolescents. Awareness and understanding of these features can help parents, teachers, and healthcare providers develop improved prevention and intervention techniques and programs to minimize

Suicide has become one of the leading cause of death in adolescents. More youth die from suicide than from cancer, heart disease, AIDS, birth defects, stroke, pneumonia, influenza, and chronic lung disease, combined. I ask myself, what has changed in the past years that has caused these rates to continuously increase. When you do research on adolescent suicide you’ll find hundreds of studies based on background, race, poverty, bullying etc., but very few include analysis of trends among sexual minority youth from cohorts of the same geographic population (Peter et al., 2016)

A new study suggested that extended use of electronic devices, such as laptops, smartphones, and tablets may cause symptoms of depression in teens. According to the researchers from the San Diego State University and Florida State University that people, particularly teens, who spend more time in social media are more vulnerable to develop depression.

Today’s teenagers are faced with the ever changing world around them and the biological changes of their bodies. Many teens are also faced with depression. Approximately half of teenagers with untreated depression may attempt suicide, which remains the third leading cause of death in this age group. (Bostic). This depression affects their school, family lives, and robs them of their self image. Depression affects many teens and often goes by unnoticed and untreated.

As a teenager I have said many times before that I hate my life. I know many people who express hatred for the life that they live. Most of those kids only say it because the one time they didn’t get something they wanted came around. But little do people think before they talk, many people actually do hate their lives and try to end their lives every day. Once every minute someone tries to commit suicide. 60-70 times a day these attempts succeed.