Abstract
Background: Literature reports a genetic component for suicidal behavior, especially of determinant/violent type. One of the candidates has been the polymorphism 5-HTTLPR in the serotonin promoter. Employing a between group design, we wished to test the association between suicidal behavior and serotonin-related polymorphisms.
Method: 350 Danish patients with average 14 years’ duration of illness and with well researched history of suicidal behavior participated. Three groups were identified: 1. without suicidal behavior, 2. with suicidal behavior of nondeterminant/ non-violent methods, and 3. suicidal behavior with determinant/violent methods. We used the common alleles S and L as well as the new aspect with allelic subtypes SA, SG, LA.LG to constitute 3 functional genotypes: SS, SL and LL. We also included duration of illness, age at onset and sex in our study as potential covariates.
Results: We tested suicidal behavior types 2 and 3 versus type 1 for distribution differences as well as for possible trend. We did not find any statistical significant relations.
Conclusions: We could not find support for a relevant relation between the polymorphisms in the serotonin promoter and suicidal behavior in our schizophrenic patient sample.
Method: 350 Danish patients with average 14 years’ duration of illness and with well researched history of suicidal behavior participated. Three groups were identified: 1. without suicidal behavior, 2. with suicidal behavior of nondeterminant/ non-violent methods, and 3. suicidal behavior with determinant/violent methods. We used the common alleles S and L as well as the new aspect with allelic subtypes SA, SG, LA.LG to constitute 3 functional genotypes: SS, SL and LL. We also included duration of illness, age at onset and sex in our study as potential covariates.
Results: We tested suicidal behavior types 2 and 3 versus type 1 for distribution differences as well as for possible trend. We did not find any statistical significant relations.
Conclusions: We could not find support for a relevant relation between the polymorphisms in the serotonin promoter and suicidal behavior in our schizophrenic patient sample.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 9-12 |
Number of pages | 4 |
Journal | The Open Psychiatry Journal |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2009 |
Keywords
- suicidal behavior
- genetics
- schizophrenia
- sertonin transporter