A new study in JAMA Psychiatry has found a correlation between being hospitalized with an infection to increased risk of suicide death. The study also found people with hepatitis, HIV or AIDS have the highest risk of suicide.
Researchers in Denmark examined all living people in Denmark 15 years old or older from 1980 through 2011, resulting in a pool of more than 7.2 million people, for hospitalizations caused by infection. Infections were grouped by pathogen and infection type.
Among the population pool, 809,384 people (11.2 percent) were hospitalized with an infection in that time period. There were 32,683 suicides during follow-up, and 7,892 of them (24.1 percent) had been previously diagnosed with an infection during hospitalization.
Overall, study results showed hospitalization with infection was linked to a 42 percent higher risk of suicide death compared to people without infection.
Additionally, risk of death by suicide increased when there were more infections and longer treatment.
"Our findings indicate that infections may have a relevant role in the pathophysiological mechanisms of suicidal behavior," the authors concluded. "Provided that the association between infection and the risk of death by suicide was causal, identification and early treatment of infections could be explored as a public health measure for prevention of suicide. Still, further efforts are needed to clarify the exact mechanisms by which infection influences human behavior and risk of suicide."