Dog and Cat Ownership among Suicides and Matched Controls

KNUD J. HELSING, SCD,

Abstract: In Washington County, Maryland, ownership of cats
and/or dogs was compared among 48 residents who committed
suicide in the years 1975-83 and 96 living controls matched to the
suicides by race, sex, and date of birth. Another comparison used as
controls persons of same race, sex, and age who died of causes other
than suicide in the same year as the suicide. No material association
between pet ownership and suicide was observed. (Am J Public
Health 1985;75:1223-1224.)

Introduction
Beck and Katcher have noted that the use of pets as
therapy to improve the morale of the elderly and psychiatrically ill is based in part upon an assumption that pet owners
have better health than non-owners.' They stress the need
for more controlled trials, since the evidence is not consistent.23 In the course of a study in Washington County,
Maryland, the opportunity arose to investigate the relation
between pet ownership and suicide. Although there is no
literature suggesting that pet ownership protects against
suicide, it seems reasonable to believe that psychological
well-being might have a bearing on suicide.
Methods
In July of 1975, a non-official census of Washington
County, conducted by the Johns Hopkins Training Center
for Public Health Research, obtained information on an
estimated 90 per cent of the total county population. For
each adult, the information included race, sex, date of birth,
marital status, and education. For each household, the
following question was asked: "On the property on which
you live, are there any of the following animals or pets?"
Cattle, horses, pigs, sheep or goats, dogs, cats, chickens or
pet birds, and "others" were listed, to be checked if present.
A list of all deaths of individuals identified as residents
of Washington County at time of death was available for the
period July 16, 1975 to July 15, 1983. The 1975 census
number was determined for each decedent who participated
in that census.
In the eight-year period, there were 85 suicides by
Washington County residents. Of these, 17 had moved to the
county since the 1975 census, 17 had not participated in the
census, and three had not answered the questions about
animals on premises. For this study, the 48 suicides who
participated in the 1975 census and answered the question
about animals were listed as cases. Two sets of two controls
per case were then selected.
Set #1 comprised two living controls for each case,
selected from the birth date listing of the 1975 census as
being the next younger and next older individual of the same
race and sex as the case. Both controls selected were
checked to be sure they were still alive in Washington
From the Department of Epidemiology, School of Hygiene and Public
Health, Johns Hopkins University. Address reprint requests to Dr. Knud J.
Helsing, Johns Hopkins Training Center for Public Health Research, Washington County Health Department, PO Box 2067, Hagerstown, MD
21742-2067. This paper, submitted to the Journal October 16, 1984, was
revised and accepted for publication March 27, 1985.

1985 American Journal of Public Health 0090-0036/85$1.50

AJPH October 1985, Vol. 75, No. 10

AND

MARY MONK, PHD

TABLE 1-Number of Suicides 1975-83 by Washington County, Maryland Residents Who Had Participated in a Private Health
Census, by Sex and Age

Age (years)
15-24
25-44
45-64
65+
TOTALS

Men

Women

Total

4
10
14
5
33

0
5
8
2
15

4
15
22
7
48

County on the date of death of the suicide case. Almost all

the controls were born within a week of their respective
cases.

Set #2 comprised two controls per case, selected from

the death certificate listings as individuals who had died of
causes other than suicide in the same year as the case,
matched for race and sex, and between three years older and
five years younger than the case. These controls were
selected without regard to whether or not they had participated in the 1975 census.
For the 48 cases and for all the controls who were in the
1975 census, data were recorded on what animals were on
the subjects' premises. Only the presence of dogs or cats
was considered "pet ownership" in the following analyses.
Matched analyses were then conducted, using the procedures described by Schlesselman4 for outcome with two
controls per case as well as for outcomes with one control
per case.
Results

Table 1 shows the age and sex distribution of the 48

suicides in the study. As expected, there were more than
twice as many men as women; the age and sex distribution
approximates that for the total of all 85 suicides. Compared
with the United States as a whole, there are fewer young
suicides in Washington County.
Taking the first set of two controls per case, selected
from the 1975 census population as matched exactly by age,
sex, and race to the respective cases, the first case-control
comparison counted the number of cases and controls who
had either dogs or cats or both on the property, without
regard to presence or absence of other animals.
Table 2 shows the complete data for all 48 case-control
sets with regard to dog or cat ownership, and illustrates the
format used to calculate the odds ratio. For simplicity it is
assumed that the dog or cat was a family pet. Table 3 shows
the odds ratio (OR) and 95 per cent Confidence Interval (CI):
TABLE 2-Pet Ownership among Suicides and Living Controls, Washington County, Maryland, 1975-83
Pet Ownership among Living Controls
Pet Ownership
among Suicides

Both Controls
Had a Pet

One Control
Had a Pet

Neither Control
Had a Pet

Had a Pet
Did Not Have a Pet

8
9

13
7

6
5

1 223

PUBLIC HEALTH BRIEFS

TABLE 3-Pet Ownership among Suicides and Living Controls; Total and Subgroup Data
Number of Triples
(suicide and two
matched controls)

% of Suicides
Having a Pet

% of Controls
Having a Pet

Odds ratio
(95% confidence
interval)

48
48
48

56.2
41.7
29.2

56.2
42.7
25.0

1.00 (0.50-2.01)
0.95 (0.20-5.93)
1.22 (0.37-4.00)

33
15
38
19
29

57.6
53.3
47.4
52.6
58.6

56.1
56.7
43.4
60.5
53.4

1.06 (0.46-2.46)
0.88 (0.06-13.7)
1.19 (0.24-5.93)
0.73 (0.08-6.42)
1.21 (0.24-6.05)

TOTAL
Dogs
Cats
Subgroups
Men
Women
Non-farm residences
Died 1975-78
Died 1978-83

a) for total; b) for dog ownership and cat ownership separately; c) for men and women separately; d) for persons in
non-farm residences, where the dog or cat is more likely to
be a pet; and e) for suicides between 1975 and 1978, closer in
time to the 1975 census, and for suicides after 1978. All of the
odds ratio estimates are close to 1.0.
Data from the second set of controls yielded 27 cases
with two controls for each identified in the 1975 census, 16
cases with only one of the controls so identified, and five
cases with neither control identified in the 1975 census. The
controls in set #2 were Washington County residents who
had died of causes other than suicide, in the same year as the
suicide. As with the first set of controls, there seems to be
virtually no association of pet ownership with suicide (Table
4). The OR estimate is 0.91 and the 95 per cent CI is
0.49-1.69. When the dead controls were compared with
suicides in the same sub-groups as shown in Table 3, again
there were no noteworthy associations found between suicide and pet ownership.
Finally, the estimated OR and CI was calculated for the
48 suicides and all controls, both living and dead, with the
result OR = 0.98 (0.66-1.45).
TABLE 4-Pet Ownership among Suicides and Matched Controls Who
Died of other Causes, Washington County, Maryland, 1975-83

Discussion
These data have several important limitations. The
study has not measured the possible effects of introducing
pets into people's homes. The fact that there is dog or cat on
one's premises does not always mean that the person considers that animal his or her own pet, and there is nothing
that measures the degree of attachment that existed. Also
the presence of a cat or dog in 1975 does not necessarily
mean that one was present in 1976, 1983, or whenever the
suicide took place.
Nevertheless, the ownership or a pet or lack thereof in
1975 should distinguish two groups that also differ substantially in this regard in subsequent years. Whatever may be
the positive health effects of pets, they seemed not large
enough to affect suicide substantially in this population. The
small number of suicides in this study does, of course, limit
the precision of our measurement so that our data would still
be reasonably compatible with as much as a 50 per cent
decrease in risk for suicide.
One strength of the study is that the suicides and the
controls all came from the same population and provided
information about the cats and dogs prior to the event. The
use of two sets of controls also adds strength to the findings.
Finally, the consistency of results regardless of how the data
are broken down lends confidence to the conclusion that cat
or dog ownership is not an important factor in suicide by the
owner.

A. Two Controls per Suicide

Pet ownership among Controls

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This research was supported in part by the National Institute of Mental
Health, NIH, 1 ROI MH 38317. The authors thank Mary Elgin for her help in
selecting controls for this study.

Pet Ownership
among Suicides

Both Controls
Had a Pet

One Control
Had a Pet

Neither Control
Had a Pet

HadaPet
Did Not Have a Pet

7
3

4
3

B. One Control per Suicide

Pet Ownership
Control Had
a Pet
among Suicides
Had a pet
Did Not Have a Pet

4
7

Combined Odds Ratio = 0.91 (0.49-1.69).

1224

REFERENCES
Control Did Not
Have a Pet
3
2

1. Beck AM, Katcher AH: A new look at pet-facilitated therapy. J Am Vet

Med Assoc 1984; 184:414-421.
2. Ory MG, Goldberg EL: Pet possession and well-being in elderly women.

Res Aging 1983; 5:389409.

3. Friedmann E, Katcher AH, Lynch JJ: Animal companions and one-year
survival after discharge from a coronary-care unit. Public Health Rep 1980;
95:307-312.
4. Schlesselman JJ: Case-control Studies. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1982.

AJPH October 1985, Vol. 75, No. 10