Citation

Zhang L, Su TP, Choi K, Maree W, Li CT, Chung MY, Chen YS, Bai YM, Chou YH, Barker JL, Barrett JE, Li XX, Li H, Benedek DM, Ursano R. J. Psychiatr. Res. 2011; 45(4): 435-441.

Affiliation

Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress, Department of Psychiatry, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD 20814, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.jpsychires.2010.08.012

PMID

20863517

Abstract

Although suicide represents 1.8% of the global burden of disease, there are few objective assays for suicide risk. Being associated with depressive disorders, which have a high risk of suicide, the proteins P11, P2RX7, and S100β may be biomarkers for a suicidal disposition. We measured levels of p11 and P2RX7 mRNA in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of 26 psychiatric patients (11 suicide attempters, 15 suicide non-attempters) with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and major depressive disorder (MDD), and 14 normal controls, using quantitative real-time PCR. We also conducted a meta-analysis of microarray data of p11, P2RX7 and S100β from post-mortem prefrontal cortex (PFC) of patients who committed suicide (n = 56) and non-suicide controls (n = 61). We found that PBMC p11 mRNA levels were significantly lower in suicide attempters and higher in suicide non-attempters, when compared to normal controls. The PFC p11 mRNA levels in suicide completers were also lower than non-suicide controls (adjusted p = 0.007). Unlike p11, PBMC P2RX7 mRNA levels were significantly lower than normal controls in all patients including suicide attempters, suicide non-attempters, and suicide completers. In addition, levels of S100β in PFC did not differ between suicide completers and non-suicide controls. These results suggest that PBMC p11 mRNA levels may be a potential adjunctive biomarker for the assessment of suicide risk in mental disorders and warrants a larger translational study to determine its clinical utility.

Language: en