Comparing episodes of antidepressants use with intermittent episodes of no use: A higher relative risk of suicide attempts but not of suicide at young age

• Published in: Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford) 2016-10, Vol.30 (10), p.1000-1007
• Main Authors: Termorshuizen, Fabian, Smeets, Hugo M, Boks, Marco PM, Heerdink, Eibert R
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Antidepressants; Antidepressive Agents - adverse effects; Antidepressive Agents - therapeutic use; Cohort Studies; Depressive Disorder - drug therapy; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Netherlands; Psychopharmacology; Risk Factors; Side effects; Suicide - statistics & numerical data; Suicide, Attempted - statistics & numerical data; Suicides & suicide attempts; Young Adult
• ISSN: 0269-8811; 1461-7285
• DOI: 10.1177/0269881116639752

The Food and Drug Administration has issued a number of advisories regarding a possible causal link between antidepressants and suicide behaviour among young persons. We investigated the age dependency of (fatal) suicide attempts associated with antidepressants (N=232,561). By linking insurance claims with the death register of Statistics Netherlands (2002–2011), rates of (fatal) suicide attempts were estimated during antidepressant use and intermittent episodes without use. The age dependency of the relative risk of attempts and of suicide during episodes with compared with episodes without antidepressants was investigated by testing the {age × episode} interaction. The attempt rate during antidepressant use decreased with increasing age, concurrently with a decrease of the relative risk from 3.62 to 1.86 (p for interaction