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Background: Media guidelines for suicide reporting are available in many countries. However, to what extent the mass media comply with the guidelines is unknown. Few studies are available that investigate systematically whether the mass media reflect the epidemiological reality of suicide deaths in their articles. Methods: Based on the WHO media guidelines, this study investigated the characteristics of newspaper articles of suicides in three Chinese communities, namely Hong Kong, Taiwan and Guangzhou. Epidemiological comparisons were conducted to identify the age and gender differences between the suicide victims as reported in the newspapers and the official records of suicide deaths in all three places. Results: The results found that one media characteristic complied with the WHO media guidelines (ie, only about 2% of the articles were printed on the front page), but there were a number of instances of non-compliance (ie, only 4--14% provided sources for help-seeking and 27--90% printed with photos). The epidemiological comparisons revealed an over-representation of younger suicides and an under-representation of late-life suicides in the newspapers of all three places. Furthermore, female suicides were found to be under-reported in Taiwan and Guangzhou newspapers, but not in Hong Kong papers. Conclusion: Non-compliant suicide articles are prevalent in the newspapers of these three Chinese settings. The observed media misrepresentations may potentially mislead the public and the policy makers about the actual risk for suicide in some demographic groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The aim of this study was to compare the prevalence of behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) in cognitively impaired elderly residents of long‐term care facilities in East Asia and to explore the factors associated with these patterns. Methods: This was a cross‐sectional survey of BPSD in cognitively impaired elderly residents of long‐term care facilities in Japan, South Korea, China, Taiwan, and Thailand. The Mini‐Mental State Examination, Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR), and Neuropsychiatric Inventory, Nursing Home version (NPI‐NH), were used to assess cognitive status, dementia severity, and BPSD, respectively. NPI‐NH subscale severity scores were multiplied by frequency scores to obtain the subscale scores and aggregated into two groups based on score (clinically insignificant = 1– 3; clinically significant ≥4). Results: Data from 662 people were analyzed. Median age, median Mini‐Mental State Examination scores, and median CDR scores differed significantly among the seven study sites. The prevalence of BPSD varied from 64% in Taiwan to 100% in dementia care units in Japan, and the median total NPI‐NH scores ranged from 2 in Taiwan to 14 in dementia care units in Japan. After stratification of the sample by dementia severity and clinical significance of NPI‐NH scores, differences in the prevalence of clinically significant BPSD were mostly observed among facilities dedicated to dementia patients in the CDR 1 group. In the CDR 3 group, the prevalence of some clinically significant BPSD, such as apathy, was high even among study sites with low median total NPI‐NH scores. Conclusions: Our findings may suggest referral and selection biases in the study sites. Future prospective studies are needed to address the impact of environmental and care factors on the occurrence of BPSD in Asian countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]