Year: 2008 Source: International Journal of Legal Medicine, v.122, no.2, (March 2008), p.115-121 SIEC No: 20101164

From each case of suicide & drug-related death autopsied in the Institute of Forensic Medicine, Munich during the years 2001-2005, a toxicological investigation for antidepressants was performed. In 180 suicides & 72 narcotic drug deaths, antidepressants were detected. There were serious differences in the frequency of antidepressants with respect to the manner of suicide. The differing frequency distributions of antidepressants with violent & nonviolent suicides may be explained by their different pharmacological active profiles & the different lethality of overdoses of the different antidepressants. There was no indication for a special suicidal problem of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors in juveniles. (32 refs.) JA