Suicide and self-harm

Introduction

On average, more than 3,000 Australians lose their lives by suicide each year.¹ Each suicide is devastating to family, friends and the community. It is estimated that an additional 135 people are affected by each death.²

The Queensland Suicide Prevention Plan 2019–2029,³ along with Better Care Together,⁴ focus on strengthening services to ensure that everyone can access the support they need, achieve positive mental health and wellbeing and live their lives with meaning and purpose. This will be achieved under 4 action areas:

1. Building resilience. Improve wellbeing in our people and communities.
2. Reducing vulnerability. Strengthen support to vulnerable people.
3. Enhancing responsiveness. Enhance responses to suicidality.
4. Working together. Achieve more by working together.³

Suicide and self-harm burden

In 2024, 160,000 years of healthy life were lost due to suicide and self-harm injuries, making it the 8th leading cause of overall health burden in Australia. The age-standardised rate (ASR or standardised rate) of healthy life lost was 6.2 per 1,000 persons.⁵

The health expenditure for suicide and self-harm injuries in 2022–23 in Australia was $361.2 million.⁶

Measurement

The AIHW describes suicide as “an action taken to deliberately end one’s own life, while intentional self-harm is deliberately causing physical harm to oneself but not necessarily with the intention of dying”.⁷ Information on suspected suicide deaths was sourced from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW)⁷ and from the Suicide in Queensland–Annual Report 2023.⁸ Suspected suicide refers to a person’s death that appears to be by suicide, but the coronial investigation and determination of the type of death is still ongoing.⁸

Suspected suicide deaths

This section provides a high level summary of the Suicide in Queensland Annual Report 2023.⁸ Please see the full report for comprehensive information on suspected suicide deaths in Queensland.

In 2023, there were 782 suspected suicide deaths in Queensland for a standardised suicide mortality rate of 14.1 per 100,000 persons.⁸ Standardised suicide rates were (Figure 1):

• highest in adults 50 to 54 years for both males and females (33.2 and 13.8 per 100,000, respectively)
• 3.0 times higher in males (21.3 per 100,000) than females (7.1 per 100,000) with higher rates in males evident across nearly all age groups
• males experienced much higher rates of suicides deaths than females for some age groups with rates 5.2 times higher in 25 to 29 year old males (30.4 per 100,000) than in their female peers (5.8 per 100,000) and 5.8 times higher in males 65 to 69 years (24.2 per 100,000) than their females peers (4.2 per 100,000).⁸

Figure 1: Suspected suicide deaths in Queensland, 2023

National comparison

In 2023, preliminary data suggests that suicide mortality rates were somewhat higher in Queensland (14.2 per 100,000) than Australia (11.8 per 100,000) but patterns over time were similar. Suicide rates were lowest in Victoria (10.9 per 100,000), New South Wales (9.9 per 100,000) and the Australian Capital Territory (7.7 per 100,000) and highest in the Northern Territory (17.0 per 100,000).⁹

Figure 2: Suicide deaths by states and territories

Reported values from AIHW (Figure 2) may vary slightly to those reported by QMHC.

Further information is available at Deaths by suicide in Australia.

Intentional self-harm

Admitted patient episodes of care are coded using the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, Tenth Revision, Australian Modification (ICD-10-AM).¹⁰

ICD codes divide diseases and health conditions into similar categories (ICD chapters) based on the type of disease, the body systems affected, or the circumstances that caused the condition. While changes to ICD coding over time affects the interpretability of the results, understanding admission patterns by ICD chapters provides insights into the broad reasons people are hospitalised. This section reports hospital admissions in Queensland based on the AIHW classification intentional self-harm.

In 2022–23, there were 7,300 admitted patient episodes for intentional self-harm in Queensland for a standardised rate of 143.6 per 100,000 persons. Hospitalisations were 2.1 times more likely for females than males (standardised rates of 194.2 per 100,000 for females and 94.4 per 100,000 for males).

Hospitalisations for intentional self-harm varied by sex and age. For example, the age-specific rate in 2022–23 for (Figure 3):

• females 10 to 19 years was 9.6 times higher than for females 65 and older (494.7 and 51.8 per 100,000, respectively)
• males 20 to 29 years was 3.4 times higher than for males 65 and older (178.6 and 52.9 per 100,000, respectively)
• females 10 to 19 years was 4.5 times higher than for males 10 to 19 years (494.7 and 110.4 per 100,000, respectively).

Hospitalisations for intentional self-harm varied by remoteness and socioeconomic status with standardised rates in (Figure 3):

• remote areas were 50.1% higher than in major cities (205.6 and 137.0 per 100,000 persons, respectively)
• the most disadvantaged areas were 2.0 times higher than in the most advantaged areas (231.7 and 115.1 per 100,000 persons, respectively).

Figure 3: Queensland hospitalisations for intentional self-harm

Note: For children, especially those aged under 10, it is difficult to determine whether a self-inflicted injury was done with intent to self-harm.

Trends

High level trends, reported as the average annual percentage change (APC) in figures and translated to changes over the specified time period in text, are presented (Figure 3). It is acknowledged that these results may differ from more detailed trend analyses that include factors explaining variability, or more changes in rates, over time. In this report, the intent is to demonstrate differences in trends across health conditions using a consistent approach. To control for the ageing of the population, age standardised rates were used. For further details, please refer to About this Report.

Queensland standardised hospitalisation rates for intentional self-harm were stable overall and for males and females from 2013–14 to 2022–23 (Figure 3).

Over the period, age-specific hospitalisation rates for intentional self-harm was higher for females 10 to 19 years and 20 to 19 years than other groups, but there is no evidence of increase over the period. Patterns do show variability over time, especially from 2020–21, so results should be interpreted with caution. Ongoing monitoring is essential.

Decreases in rates were seen for some age groups. From 2013–14 to 2022–23, hospitalisations for self-harm decreased for some age groups (Figure 3):

• females 30 to 44 years decreased by 33.3%
• males 30 to 44 years decreased by 25.4%
• females 45 to 64 years decreased by 30.7%.

National comparison

From 2008–09 to 2022–23, Queensland rates of intentional self-harm hospitalisations were consistently higher than national rates. In 2022–23, hospitalisation rates for intentional self-harm were 44.7% higher in Queensland (137.8 per 100,000 persons) than in Australia (95.2 per 100,000 persons). The Northern Territory had the highest rates of intentional self-harm hospitalisations (193.0 per 100,000 persons) and New South Wales experienced the lowest rate (62.2) in 2022–23.¹¹

AIHW reported that, for males 24 and under, the rates of intentional self-harm hospitalisations in Queensland increased from 68 per 100,000 in 2008–09 and peaked at 128 per 100,000 in 2020–21 then decreased to 82 per 100,000 in 2022–23, while other jurisdictions remained relatively stable. One of the largest increases was among Queensland males 65 years and over with the number of intentional self-harm hospitalisations increasing from 38 per 100,000 in 2008–09 to 53 in 2022–23.¹¹

Figure 4: National trends for intentional self-harm

National information on intentional self-harm hospitalisations is available Intentional self-harm hospitalisations by states & territories.

Comparison of self-harm and suicide

While suicide deaths are more common among males, hospitalisations for intentional self-harm occur more frequently among females.

Standardised suicide rates were 3.0 times higher in males (21.3 per 100,000) than females (7.1 per 100,000) and were higher in nearly all age groups. Self-harm hospitalisations, however, were 2.1 times higher in females (standardised rates of 194.2 per 100,000 for females and 94.4 per 100,000 for males).

Figure 5: Queensland suicide (2023) and self-harm (2022–23) rates by sex

When interpreting this figure please note difference on y-axis.

Additional information

Data and statistics

More information is available from QMHC:

• The Queensland Suicide Register (QSR)

From the AIHW:

• Suicide and self-harm monitoring
• Interactive data on disease burden from the Australian burden of disease study

From the ABS:

• National Study of Mental Health and Wellbeing

Strategies and general information

• Everyday life: The Queensland Suicide Prevention Plan 2019-2029
• Better Care Together: A plan for Queensland’s state-funded mental health, alcohol and other drug services to 2027
• National Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Agreement
• Bilateral Schedule on Mental Health and Suicide Prevention: Queensland
• The Australian Government’s National Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Plan

Section technical notes

The Interim Queensland Suicide Register includes suspected suicide deaths in years 2019 to 2023 which are routinely updated with coronial findings.¹² AIHW determine suicide deaths from the AIHW National Mortality Database and from the Australian Bureau of Statistics for cause of death. Unit records are provided to the Registries of Births, Deaths and Marriages and to the National Coronial Information System and include a cause of death coded by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.⁷

Caution is advised when comparing suicide death rates between states and territories. This is because rates fluctuate over time, there are a small number of suicide deaths registered each year, and differences in the coronial process and data processing exist between the states and territories.⁷

Hospitalisation data reported in this section were sourced from the Queensland Hospital Admitted Patient Data Collection (QHAPDC). The QHAPDC is episode based, meaning that multiple episodes from a single person will be counted in a reporting period. Separations from interstate residents, public psychiatric hospitals, and those flagged as unqualified newborns, organ donors or boarders are excluded. Due to the definitions used, the statistics presented here may not be comparable to other reports. See additional information under About this report.

Please see the AIHW admitted patient care data quality statement for additional information.

Figure 2 is maintained by AIHW from National Mortality data and ABS cause of Death data. Numbers differ slightly to those reported by the QMHC due to different methods of ascertainment.

Figure 4 is maintained by AIHW. While the data is derived from hospital admissions data from each state and territory, numbers differ slightly to those obtained from the Queensland Hospital Admissions Data.