20 Percent of Children at Risk of Suicidal Behavior Have Access to Guns at Home

A new study highlights a shocking fact about suicidal children. Many of them actually have access to guns in their own homes.

According to the study, nearly 20 percent of children contemplating suicide have access to guns in their home, and 15 percent know how to get their hands on both the guns and the bullets.

"That's a volatile mix: kids at risk and the means to complete suicide," said Stephen Teach, who will present the study Monday at a meeting of the Pediatric Academic Societies in Washington.

A recent meeting with the American Academy of Pediatrics focused on gun violence and the dangers surrounding children.

According to reports, more than 1,900 young people in the U.S. ages 5 to 19 committed suicide in 2010. Nearly half of these suicides involved firearms, said Matthew Miller, an associate professor at the Harvard School of Public Health, who spoke at the symposium. Suicide is the third-leading cause of death among teens ages 15 to 19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

According to the study, doctors interviewed 524 young people ages 10 to 21 who were treated in pediatric emergency rooms, either for a physical or psychiatric health issue.

And some researchers believe the findings from the study may actually be underestimated.

Guns are the most lethal form of suicide. According to the CDC, 85 percent of suicide attempts with guns prove fatal, compared with 1 to 2 percent of attempts made by slashing one's wrists or taking pills.

Reducing teens' access to guns can be life-saving, Miller said. Studies show that many teen suicide attempts are impulsive. One-fourth of teens who survived a suicide attempt said they thought of suicide just five minutes before making the attempt.