A paucity of literature exists on risk factors for mortality in
charcoal burning suicide. In this observational study, we analyzed the data of 126 patients with
charcoal burning suicide that seen between 2002 and 2013. Patients were grouped according to status of renal damage as
acute kidney injury (N = 49) or non-
acute kidney injury (N = 77). It was found that patients with
acute kidney injury suffered severer complications such as
respiratory failure (P = 0.002), myocardial injury (P = 0.049), hepatic injury (P < 0.001),
rhabdomyolysis (P = 0.045) and
out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (P = 0.028) than patients without
acute kidney injury. Moreover, patients with
acute kidney injury suffered longer hospitalization duration (16.9 ± 18.3 versus 10.7 ± 10.9, P = 0.002) and had higher mortality rate (8.2% versus 0%, P = 0.011) than patients without injury. In a multivariate Cox regression model, it was demonstrated that serum
creatinine level (P = 0.019) and heart rate (P = 0.022) were significant risk factors for mortality. Finally, Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed that patients with
acute kidney injury suffered lower cumulative survival than without injury (P = 0.016). In summary, the overall mortality rate of
charcoal burning suicide population was 3.2%, and
acute kidney injury was a powerful predictor of mortality. Further studies are warranted.