ReviewThe American journal of psychiatry2016
Prevention of Firearm Suicide in the United States: What Works and What Is Possible.
Review in The American journal of psychiatry, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 74 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
74 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Association Between Means Restriction of Poison and Method-Specific Suicide Rates: A Systematic Review.JAMA health forum · 2021Pooled it
- Improving Suicide Prevention Through Evidence-Based Strategies: A Systematic Review.The American journal of psychiatry · 2021Pooled it
- Suicide in Parkinson's disease.Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry · 2019Pooled it
- An Interactive Web-Based Lethal Means Safety Decision Aid for Suicidal Adults (Lock to Live): Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial.Journal of medical Internet research · 2020Trial
- A randomized controlled trial of public messaging to promote safe firearm storage among U.S. military veterans.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2019Trial
- Medicaid Expansion and Firearm Suicide Mortality Among Black and White Men: A State-Level Retrospective Study, United States, 2000-2023.American journal of public health · 2026Article
- Cause-specific mortality among U.S. service members and veterans (2001-2018): comparison to the U.S. general population.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Project Safe Guard-Trauma (PSG-T): Protocol for a randomized controlled trial of lethal means safety counseling to promote secure firearm storage among individuals with PTSD.Contemporary clinical trials communications · 2025Article
- Sex Differences in Life-Course Suicide Rates by State Firearm Policy Environment.American journal of preventive medicine · 2025Article
- Evaluation of suicide patterns, causes and triggering factors in children and adolescents.BMC pediatrics · 2025Article
- Safety or Risk? Exploring Perceptions of Firearm-Related Risks Among Military Service Members and Civilian Employees at a Military Installation.Journal of injury & violence research · 2025Article
- Method-specific suicide mortality rates among older adults in 47 countries and territories, 1996-2021, with projections to 2050: a global time series and modelling study.The lancet. Healthy longevity · 2025Article
- Association of Client and Provider Race with Approaches Pursued by Social Workers for Reducing Firearm Access.Journal of racial and ethnic health disparities · 2025Article
- Evidence for Public Policies to Prevent Suicide Death in the United States.Annual review of public health · 2025Review
- Article
- Global, regional, and national burden of suicide, 1990-2021: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021.The Lancet. Public health · 2025Article
- Posttraumatic growth among mental health officers who treat soldiers with non-suicidal self-harm/suicidal behavior: The role of cognitive and personality characteristics.Military psychology : the official journal of the Division of Military Psychology, American Psychological Association · 2025Article
- Developing a model for predicting suicide risk among prostate cancer survivors.Frontiers in medicine · 2025Article
- Suicide Screening, Risk Assessment, and Lethal Means Counseling During Zero Suicide Implementation.Psychiatric services (Washington, D.C.) · 2024Article
- A Statistical Analysis of the Impact of Gun Ownership on Mass Shootings in the USA Between 2013 and 2022.Journal of urban health : bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine · 2024Article
14 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
- Commented on by
- Commented on by
- Commented on by
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveAbout 21,000 suicides in the United States in 2014 involved a firearm. The authors reviewed evidence from around the world regarding the relationship between firearm ownership rates and firearm suicide rates and the potential effectiveness of policy-based strategies for preventing firearm suicides in the United States.
methodRelevant publications were identified by searches of PubMed, PsycINFO, MEDLINE, and Google Scholar from 1980 to September 2015, using the search terms suicide AND firearms OR guns. Excluding duplicates, 1,687 results were found, 60 of which were selected for inclusion; these sources yielded an additional 10 studies, for a total of 70 studies.
resultsCase-control and ecological studies investigating geographic and temporal variations in firearm ownership and firearm suicide rates indicate that greater firearm availability is associated with higher firearm suicide rates. Time-series analyses, mostly from other countries, show that legislation reducing firearm ownership lowers firearm suicide rates. Because the Second Amendment curtails legislation broadly restricting firearm access in the United States, the emphasis is shifted to restricting access for those at risk of harming themselves or others. Most suicides involve guns purchased years earlier. Targeted initiatives like gun violence restraining orders, smart gun technology, and gun safety education campaigns potentially reduce access to already purchased firearms by suicidal individuals. Such measures are too new to have evidence of effectiveness.
conclusionsBroadly reducing availability and access to firearms has lowered firearm suicide rates in other countries but does not appear feasible in the United States. Approaches restricting access of at-risk individuals to already purchased firearms by engaging the public and major stakeholders require urgent implementation and outcome evaluation for firearm suicide prevention.
Indexed as
Identifiers
27444796What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.