Researchers recommended that guns either be removed from the home or stored securely and separately from ammunition.

"Removing firearms may be especially effective in reducing the risk of suicide among adolescents and other potentially impulsive members of the home," Miller said in the statement.

The Utah Department of Health recommends that guns be removed in homes where someone is at risk for suicide. Those risks include a previous attempt, substance abuse, hopelessness and mental disorders, particularly depression, Mower said.

The Harvard study is not the first to find a relationship between firearms and suicide, he said. A 1992 study in the New England Journal of Medicine also found that availability of firearms in the home is associated with increased suicide risk. A 1998 study in the Journal of Trauma, he said, found that for every time a gun is used in self-defense there are 11 attempted or completed suicides.

The Harvard research was sponsored by the Chicago-based Joyce Foundation, which supports programs in the region on topics including the environment, education and public welfare. The foundation's projects have included research on preventing violence with firearms.

The six states in the study with the lowest rates of gun ownership were Hawaii, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Connecticut and New York.

The 15 states with the highest percentage of homes with guns were Wyoming, South Dakota, Alaska, West Virginia, Arkansas, Montana, Mississippi, Idaho, North Dakota, Alabama, Kentucky, Wisconsin, Louisiana, Tennessee and Utah.

For a fact sheet on suicides in Utah and on firearm injury, go to health.utah.gov/vipp.

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Contributing: Jeanmarie Todd, Elaine Jarvik of the Deseret Morning News.