Parent death in relation to age and parental age at birth in psychiatric patients and general population controls.

Parent death occurring in childhood is an event which may have serious psychological consequences (Birtchnell, 1969a and b). Even during adult life it may be followed by a period of instability and increased vulnerability to mental breakdown (Birtchnell, 1969c and d). There are considerable problems in attempting to establish a relationship between parent death and ensuing psychiatric illness, due to the variety of factors which may be associated with parent death. In the present study two factors which have been considered important, the age of the subject and the parental age at birth, will be investigated. Their relationship to parent death will be considered in a group of psychiatric patients and a matched, local general population sample. The likelihood of losing a parent by death depends upon the life circumstances of that parent. The expectation of life varies from one era to another. Although in general it has improved during the past century, male deaths greatly increased during the 1914-18 war and deaths of both sexes increased during the 1919 influenza epidemic. The era through which the subject's parent has lived depends both upon his own age and upon that of the parent at his birth. In a group of subjects aged 20-60 in 1960, the parental birth dates may range from 1840 to 1920 for fathers and from 1860 to 1920 for mothers. Further, the children of old parents are more likely to lose them early in life and vice versa.