Distinguishing suicides of people reported missing from those not reported missing: retrospective Scottish cohort study

BACKGROUND: Understanding what distinguishes the suicide of individuals reported missing (missing-suicides) from those of individuals not reported missing (other-suicides) may have preventative and/or operational utility and inform our knowledge of suicide. AIMS: To assess whether specific epidemiological, sociodemographic or circumstantial characteristics differ between individuals reported missing and those not reported missing who take their own life. METHOD: Content analysis of Scottish Police Death Reports, detailing 160 suicides/undetermined deaths over a 3-year period in the North-East of Scotland. RESULTS: Those in the missing-suicide group were more likely to be older but did not differ from the other-suicide group on any other epidemiological or sociodemographic characteristics. Individuals in the other-suicide group were more likely to be found inadvertently by people known to them. The missing-suicide group took longer to find and were more likely to be located in natural outdoor locations by police/searchers or members of the public. CONCLUSIONS: Individuals who die by suicide and who are reported as a missing person differ from those not reported as missing in terms of factors relating to location and how they are found but not epidemiological or sociodemographic characteristics. DECLARATION OF INTEREST: None.