Abstract:
Background: Suicidal ideation is a significant public health issue since it leads to preventable
death eventually. It is a complex problem and therefore it has to be investigated in multi-level.
Objective: Present study was directed to identify the psychosocial determinants of suicidal
ideation among adults in Batticaloa District of Sri Lanka (BDSL).
Methodology: A cross-sectional study was carried out with the participation of 237 (majority age category 50-<60 years) adult patients (55.5% female) admitted to medical wards of Base
Hospital, Kaluwanchikudy (BHK) during the period of 1st January to 31st May 2019. Two stage
cluster sampling method was applied. Possible psychosocial factors for suicidal ideation were
included in the questionnaire. Statistical software (SPSS 25.0) was used to analyze the data and
p-value<0.05 was considered significant for all analyses. Explorative Factor Analysis (EFA)
was performed. Ethical approval was obtained from Ethical Review Committee, Faculty of
Health Care Sciences, Eastern University, Sri Lanka.
Results: Sampling adequacy for EFA was full filed (KMO=0.785).Independent variables were
correlated among them (Bartlett's test of Sphericity was significant (chi-square=5196.99,
p=0.00). In EFA, 28 independent variables were grouped into SIX factors that are associated
with suicidal ideation. These six factors were altogether contributed to the 66.9% of the total
variance partitioned into 24.0% by factor-01(F1), 15.9% by factor-02(F2), 7.9% by factor 03(F3), 7.0% by factor-04(F4), 6.1% by factor-05(F5) and 5.7% by factor-06(F6). The SIX
factors extracted were named as; F1-personal life and mental health status, F2-health status and
married life, F3-sexual life of married people, F4-occupational status, F5-attempted suicide and
F6-ethnicity.
Conclusions: Twenty eight independent variables were identified as associated psychosocial
factors with suicidal ideation among adult community grouped into SIX factors as;personal life
and mental health status, health status and married life, sexual life of married people,
occupational status, attempted suicide and ethnicity.
