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March 05, 2009
Study suggests PTSD may increase suicide risk in young adults
HealthDay (3/2, Preidt) reported, "Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) increases the risk of suicide in young adults, says a US study of 1,698 participants who were tracked for 15 years after they started first grade in Baltimore public schools."
During the study, which appears in the March edition of the Archives of General Psychiatry, researchers interviewed the subjects "when they were young adults (average age 21) to assess the incidence of traumatic events, suicide attempts, and the development of PTSD.
Of the group, 1,273 had experienced a traumatic event, and 100 of those exposed to trauma (eight percent) developed PTSD." Of those with PTSD, "suicide had been attempted by 10 percent...compared with 2 percent of the youths who experienced trauma but did not develop PTSD and 5 percent of those never exposed to a traumatic event."
The researchers concluded that their "results point to the need to base risk estimates of attempted suicide on data that take into account the psychiatric response to the trauma."
Related Links:
- "Post-Traumatic Stress Tied to Increased Suicide Risk," Robert Preidt, HealthDay, March 2, 2009.
Posted by admin at March 5, 2009 04:16 PM