CIHI’s Health Indicators annual report produced in partnership with Statistics Canada, presents more than 40 comparable measures of health and health system performance by health region, province and territory. The report provides new measures of health system performance for mental health services. This year the report includes a focus section on mental health, including new performance indicators that provide information about Canada’s mental health system.
Some key findings include:
- In 2009-2010, about 17,500 Canadians – or 45 people a day – were admitted to the hospital after attempting suicide or deliberately harming themselves;
- In 2009-2010, the most common method of self-injury leading to hospitalization was poisoning (85 per cent), followed by cutting or piercing (10 per cent) and strangulation (2 per cent);
- Young women age 15 to 19 were the most likely to engage in self-injury;
- Women in this demographic group had a self-injury hospitalization rate of more than 140 per 100,000 – more than double the rate of men in the same age category;
- Men were three times more likely to die from self-inflicted injuries. In 2007, 16 men per 100,000 died from self-inflicted injuries, compared with women at 5 per 100,000;
- Rates of self-injury varied across the country and were higher in the territories than in the provinces;
- In most of the self-injury hospitalizations(70 per cent), the patient also had a diagnosis of mental illness;
- Mood disorders accounted for almost one-quarter (23 per cent) of these diagnoses, followed by substance-related disorders (12 per cent) and anxiety disorders (11 per cent);
- Many mental health inpatients are readmitted shortly after discharge.
According to CIHI’s news release, self-injury rates can be regarded as indicators of access to community care. Where accessible and effective community-based intervention services are available, suicide and self-harming behaviours can be largely prevented through targeted strategies.
For more information go to: https://secure.chihi.ca.