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Page count: 19

The military physician is frequently confronted by patients who have made a suicide attempt. In an attempt to clarify the significance of these suicide attempts in the military, all patients who had made a suicide attempt in a nine-month period, and who were seen by the psychiatric staff of the U.S. Naval Aviation Medical Center, were retrospectively studied (N = 42). The suicide group was compared on 35 demographic, historical, and clinical variables to two control populations: (1) randomly selected psychiatric in-patients (N = 20) who did not make a suicide attempt; (2) well-adjusted enlisted men seen for administrative screening evaluations (N = 30). The suicide group and the psychiatric control group were followed 9 to 18 months after initial psychiatric contact. All data were statistically analyzed. From these data emerged statistically significant guidelines for the evaluation, treatment, and disposition of suicidal patients by the military psychiatrist.