The effect of altitude and climate on the suicide rates in Turkey.

Suicide is one of the most important public health problems. There was an association between suicide and several factors such as psychiatric diseases and psychological characteristics, somatic illness, cultural, socioeconomic, familial, occupational and individual risk factors. Also, high altitude and climatic factors including high temperature, cloudiness, more sunshine and low rainfalls were defined as some of these risk factors in the literature. In this study, we aimed to investigate correlation between suicide rates and altitudes of all cities in Turkey and between suicide rates and climatic factors including Rainfall Activity Index, Winter Mean Temperatures, Summer Mean Temperatures and Temperature Difference between January and July previously defined by several authors in the broad series in Turkey. In Turkey, 29865 suicidal deaths occurred in 10 years period between 2006 and 2015. Of them, 21020 (70.4%) were males and 8845 (29.6%) were females. In this study, we found that high altitude above 1500 m, winter median temperature lower than -10 °C and hard temperature changes above 25 °C between winter and summer of settlements were important factors that affected on female suicide rates appropriate to knowledge which defined in previous studies. In conclusion, we suggested that the associations among suicide rates with altitudes and climate should be studied in wider series obtained from different countries for reaching more reliable results.

The effects of gender and age on forensic personal identification from frontal sinus in a Turkish population.

OBJECTIVES: To define the dimensions of the frontal sinus in groups standardized for age and gender and to discuss the reasons and the effects of the variations. Methods: Frontal sinus measurements were obtained from paranasal CTscans of 180 males and 180 females in the Radiology Department of Dursun Odabas Medical Center of Yuzuncu Yil University, Van, which is located in Eastern Turkey, between February and March 2016. The width and height of sinuses were measured on a coronal plane, and the anteroposterior length was measured on an axial plane. Volumes were calculated using the Hospital Information Management Systems and Image Archiving and Management Systemprogram. The Statistical Package of the Social Science version 13 was used for statistical analyses.  Results: We determined differences in the frontal sinus measurements of different age groups in a Turkish adult population. Frontal sinus dimensions were usually higher in females and lower in males after 40-49 years of age than their younger counterparts, but the measurements were lower in females and higher in males in 70≤ years of age group than 60-69 years of age. Left frontal sinus was dominant in young age groups but right frontal sinus was dominant in groups 40-49 years of age or older.  Conclusion: We observed crossing of the measurements between the different age groups, which we could not find clear explanations. The results of such studies may affect forensic identification from frontal sinus measurements.