Suicide is the outcome for many patients in Portugal who are suffering from severe depression.
The president of the Alentejo Psychiatric Association said today that suicide is "the major complication and the most feared risk" of severe depression in Portugal, especially in the Alentejo, where rates in these two cases are "very high."
"There is a relationship between cause and effect in these two situations," with depression and suicide all too common in the Alentejo, according to José António Albuquerque.
The psychiatrist was speaking at the 3rd Congress of the Alentejo Psychiatric Association in Serpa, where experts have been analysing the causes of suicide such as depression and alcoholism.
Severe depressions can appear "from a relatively young age, at around 20-years old and very deep depression often follows the same downward spiral with suicide, often seasonal, being the main risk for the patient."
Some depressions have a hereditary basis, beyond the social and historical context, which is seen mostly in the Alentejo" according to Albuquerque.
In fact in the Alentejo there are more suicides than the number of those diagnosed with severe depression, with "many cases of suicide in the same family which denotes a genetic influence," commented Dr Albuquerque.
"Alcoholism, like suicide, is also often a secondary development stemming from depression," said the psychiatrist, stating that the triad of depression, alcoholism and suicide is very common in the psychopathological picture of depression in the Alentejo."
