Medical know-how raises suicide risk for doctors

An estimated 300 to 400 U.S. doctors kill themselves each year, which some doctors say is because the stigma of mental illness is magnified in a profession that prides itself on stoicism and bravado. And because doctors have easy access to prescription drugs and a precise knowledge of both how the body works and the amount of a drug needed for an overdose to stop breathing and halt the heart, it can be a dangerous combination. The American Medical Association has even called physician suicide "an endemic catastrophe."