The menace of Anesthetic Agents used for Intentional Self-harm by Healthcare Professionals

Authors: Kirthika Ravi, Ambika Prasad Patra*, Gerard Pradeep Devnath and Suresh M

DOI: 10.23880/ijfsc-16000265

Volume 7, Issue 2

Abstract

The incidences of suicide cases are alarmingly increasing among healthcare professionals. The common causes are distress from burnout and an uninterrupted work schedule leading to disrupted family life. The young professionals succumb to the frustrations of the workplace stressors like - diminished autonomy, poor self-care, unrewarding, incessant workload. Usually, female healthcare professionals are at greater risk for suicide. The suicides mostly took place at the workplace; if not all, in most cases, the stressor for self-harm is related to the victim's profession. And almost all cases that took place at the workplace were due to fatal drug overdose or toxicity. This is probably due to the easy accessibility of healthcare professionals to dangerous drugs. Using insulin and intravenous anesthetics agents are common modes of intentional self-harm among healthcare professionals. In both situations, postmortem detection becomes challenging and fixing the exact cause and the manner of death thereof. Here, we have discussed a suicide case of a scrub nurse from the General Surgery Department using intravenous vecuronium bromide.

Keywords: Vecuronium; Bromide; Suicide; Healthcare professionals; Anesthetic agent; Self harm

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