Being able to identify those at high risk for suicide is vital for prevention, but there is not currently a reliable way to predict this risk. Now, researchers from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD, say they have found a chemical alteration in a gene linked to stress responses that could enable the creation of a blood test to predict a person's risk of suicide consistently.
The study, led by Zachary Kaminsky, assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins, is published in The American Journal of Psychiatry. Their findings suggest that alterations in a gene that plays a role in the brain's response to stress hormones is involved in turning ordinary reactions to everyday stresses into suicidal tendencies.
To conduct their study, Kaminsky and his team aimed their attention at a genetic mutation in a gene called SKA2. They analyzed brain samples from deceased people, some of whom had been mentally ill and some of whom had been healthy. They found that the samples of people who died by suicide had significantly reduced levels of this gene.
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