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Biotech / Medical : TITAN PHARMACEUTICAL (TTP) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Volsi Mimir who wrote (109)	2/1/2000 8:42:00 PM
From: Miljenko Zuanic	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 362

Just parking. Serotonin 2A Receptor Gene Allele Linked to Increased Suicide Risk -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WESTPORT, Feb 01 (Reuters Health) - Canadian researchers report in the February 7th issue of the American Journal of Medical Genetics that they have discovered a genetic mutation that may be associated with an increased risk of suicide. They predict that a test to identify those at high risk of killing themselves could be available by 2002. According to the results of a 10-year study by a team from Royal Ottawa Hospital, in Ontario, Canada, depressed people with a mutation in the gene encoding for a serotonin 2A receptor were more than twice as likely to commit suicide than those without the mutation. "This is a warning sign, an early marker," team member Dr. Pavel D. Hrdina told Reuters. "There might be depressed people who don't have suicidal tendencies, who wouldn't know at the time [that they had the mutation]. Those patients would be more closely watched than others." The Ottawa researchers started by studying the brains of people who had killed themselves in Hungary, a country with one of the world's highest suicide rates. The tests showed large amounts of the mutated gene. They then carried out a long-term study on 120 depressed people in Canada. In the study, the researchers compared allele and genotype frequencies of 102T/C polymorphism in 5-HT2A receptor gene in 120 patients with major depression and 131 control subjects matched for age, sex and ethnic background. The investigators also compared the frequencies between suicidal and non-suicidal patients. Dr. Hrdina's group found a significant association between the 102 C allele in the gene and major depression. This was particularly true in patients with suicidal tendencies, the authors report. Patients with a 102 C/C genotype showed a significantly higher mean HAMD item 3 score, which indicates suicidal ideation, than T/C or T/T genotypes, the investigators say. The results "...suggest that the 102T/C polymorphism in 5-HT2A receptor gene is primarily associated with suicidal ideation in patients with major depression," the authors conclude in the journal. Dr. Hrdina said that depressed people with suicidal tendencies almost certainly carry other genetic mutations that combine to trigger suicidal inclinations. "The positive side of this is that if there is a biological or genetic test, one can give hope that with treatment this can be handled," he noted. "If this is just let go and we don't encourage people to [learn] about it, and they are not seeking medical help to treat their symptoms of depression or suicidality, they may eventually end up losing their lives." Dr. David Bakish, another member of the research team, said in a university press release that there was no reduction in the level of mutant serotonin receptor genes in patients who had been successfully treated for depression. This "...suggests that some people may be biologically predisposed to suicidal thoughts, and that suicide, so often stigmatized, is hardly a character flaw," he said. Dr. Hrdina said that the team is now looking at whether people suffering from other mental disorders, such as schizophrenia, also carry the mutation. "There is a stigma about these things. People shy away. But it will help them when they realize [that being suicidal] is not a crazy state, or something that comes out of the air and cannot be handled, but has a biological link," he said. Am J Med Genet 2000;96:56-60.