Certain health care workers at increased risk for suicide: study

New York — Registered nurses, health technicians and health care support workers face an elevated risk of suicide compared with workers in non-health care fields, results of a recent study indicate.

A team led by researchers from Columbia University looked at data from a nationally representative sample of more than 1.8 million workers in the 2008 American Community Survey. That data was then compared with National Death Index records through the end of 2019.

Findings show that health care support workers had a suicide rate of 21 per 100,000 person years, compared with 13 for non-health care workers. Meanwhile, the rate for both registered nurses and health technicians was 16 per 100,000 person years.

“Until now, little was known about suicide risks of the approximately 95% of health care workers who are not physicians,” the researchers write. “New programmatic efforts are needed to protect the mental health of these U.S. health care workers.”

Added study co-author Mark Olfson, a physician and professor at Columbia Public Health, in a press release: “Our results extend earlier research from outside the United States that health care workers compared with non-health care workers have greater risks for mental health problems and long-term work absences due to mental disorders. The importance of increased suicide risk of health care support workers is underscored by their growth from nearly 4 million in 2008 to 6.6 million in 2021.”

The study was published online in the Journal of the American Medical Association.