Suicide in veterinary medicine: A literature review

Vet World Vol.16 June-2023 Article-12

Review Article

Veterinary World, 16(6): 1266-1276

https://doi.org/10.14202/vetworld.2023.1266-1276

Carina Rodrigues da Silva^1,2, Ana Amélia Domingues Gomes¹, Thaís Rabelo dos Santos-Doni³, Alexandre Coutinho Antonelli¹, Rafael Felipe da Costa Vieira^4,5, and Alexandre Redson Soares da Silva¹

1. Department of Veterinary Medicine, Universidade Federal do Vale do São Francisco, Campus of Agricultural Sciences, Petrolina, Pernambuco, Brazil.
2. College of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA.
3. Department of Veterinary Medicine, Universidade Federal do Vale do Jequitinhonha e Mucuri, Unaí, Minas Gerais, Brazil.
4. Department of Public Health Sciences, College of Health, and Human Services, University of North Carolina, Charlotte, North Carolina, United States of America.
5. Center for Computational Intelligence to Predict Health and Environmental Risks, University of North Carolina, Charlotte, North Carolina, United States of America.

Background and Aim: Veterinarians are commonly exposed to occupational stressors, including excessive workload and financial constraints. These stressors can lead to psychological distress, which typically results in mental health disorders such as depression, anxiety, and burnout and can even culminate in suicide attempts or suicide deaths. Risk factors associated with poor mental health and high rates of suicide in veterinary practitioners include continuous exposure to challenging scenarios, such as interpersonal conflicts, performing euthanasia, and easy access to lethal means of suicide, such as opioids and anesthetics. The previous studies highlight the urgent need for a better understanding of predisposing factors, mental health-related improvements in the professional environment, and the subsequent establishment of primary mental health-related care policies. Effective ways to promote mental health and prevent suicide may include social support, resilience, developing coping skills, promoting a healthy work environment, and discouraging perfectionist behaviors. This review aimed to summarize findings in studies that have investigated mental health and suicide in veterinarians and veterinary students and highlight measures that could be implemented as options for mental health promotion and suicide prevention.

Keywords: burnout, depression, mental health, occupational stress, veterinarians.

How to cite this article: Silva CR, Gomes AAD, Santos-Doni TR, Antonelli AC, Vieira RFC, and Silva ARS (2023) Suicide in veterinary medicine: A literature review, Veterinary World, 16(6): 1266-1276.

Received: 01-03-2023 Accepted: 15-05-2023 Published online: 08-06-2023

Corresponding author: E-mail: alexandre.redson@univasf.edu.br and rvieira@charlotte.edu

DOI: 10.14202/vetworld.2023.1266-1276

Copyright: Silva, et al. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http:// creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.