Genetic Link to Suicidal Tendencies Nailed Down

A third study replicates finding that chromosome 2 region plays a vital role

By Amanda Gardner
HealthDay Reporter

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FRIDAY, Feb. 23 (HealthDay News) -- For the third time, geneticists have linked a particular area of chromosome 2 to attempted suicide, a finding which may help identify people at risk and even lead to new drug therapies.

"My goal would be to allow us to identify who is at high risk and to give pharmaceutical companies a target pathway that they can then design drugs for," said study author Virginia Willour, an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore.

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The previous two studies, both of which came out recently, looked at attempted suicide in families with alcoholism and with early-onset major depression. The current study, published in the March issue of Biological Psychiatry, looked at people with bipolar disorder.

"We're all in the same place. This is fantastic for geneticists interested in finding genetic risk factors," Willour said. "We all found the same region. That's pretty unusual, because you may be in sort of the same ballpark, but these were right on top of each other."

"Attempted suicide and suicide are very dramatic and worrisome outcomes in psychiatric patients," added Dr. Ma-Li Wong, a professor of psychiatry and vice chair for translational research at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. "This study and two other studies have pointed to this chromosome region as linked to suicide attempts, so people who commit suicide are likely to have some variation on this region."

"This is the third replication of this finding, so it's enough for us to say that it is likely these genes may be related to suicide," Wong continued.

Suicide remains a leading cause of death in the United States with, according to Willour, about 4.6 percent of Americans aged 15 to 54 having tried to end their lives.

Previous studies have provided strong evidence for a genetic component to this type of behavior, often in conjunction with psychiatric disorders, especially mood disorders and alcoholism.

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