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 Researchers examined survey data from 4,428 men and women aged 65
and older in Washington State. Overall, 1,696 participants, or 39
percent, lived in households with firearms, researchers report in
the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Only 33 percent of people in households with firearms reported that
all guns were kept locked and unloaded. Almost one in four
participants with firearms at home kept at least one gun loaded and
unlocked - the type of storage most associated with accidental
injuries and suicide.
"There is some evidence that safe storage of firearms can mitigate
the risk of suicide in homes of older adults with dementia or
depressive symptoms," said lead study author Erin Morgan of the
Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Center and the University
of Washington in Seattle.
"Unloading firearms and keeping them locked is an easy preventive
measure for patients and their families," Morgan said by email.
About 17 percent of participants had a diagnosis of depression and
another 7 percent reported frequent mental distress.
In addition, 12 percent of the older adults in the study reported
experiencing memory loss in the previous year. Only about 6 percent
reported discussing memory difficulties with a clinician.
"When people have memory loss, dementia or serious mental health
problems, the risk of suicide is higher," Morgan said. "Putting
additional barriers between someone who is potentially at risk for
suicide and the lethal means they could use to harm themselves can
save lives."
But the study didn't find any difference in how households stored
their guns based on whether participants had mental health or memory
problems.
The study wasn't designed to prove whether or how firearm storage
habits might contribute to injuries or suicides involving guns.
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Even so, the results suggest that older adults and their families
need to talk about safe gun storage, said Alex Piquero, a
criminology researcher at the University of Texas at Dallas who
wasn't involved in the study.
"Persons with dementia, memory loss, or risk factors that show a
heightened risk for suicide may increase their risk of self-harm if
they have easy and unfiltered access to firearms and may make a
decision without complete understanding of what it is they are
doing," Piquero said by email.
Seniors need to understand the importance of not just attending to
their mental health needs, but also to safely secure and store
firearms to decrease the likelihood of firearm accidents and
potentially firearm deaths, Piquero said.
"The absolute safest way to store firearms in the home to reduce
risk is to keep the firearms locked and unloaded," Piquero said.
It's less clear, however, how families can proceed when seniors have
mental health or cognitive problems that make it a good idea to
remove any firearms from the home, Piquero said.
Few states restrict access to guns when people have dementia, making
it legally challenging for guns to be removed for this reason when
older adults want to keep firearms at home, he said.
"It seems ripe for the American Medical Association and scientists
to further explore these risks in order to decide the most
appropriate policy response," Piquero said. "Failure to take this
seriously may lead to more firearm injuries and deaths among elderly
adults with mental health issues."
SOURCE: https://bit.ly/2IDoWLN Annals of Internal Medicine, online
April 15, 2019.
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