Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T11:28:27.315Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Magnetic resonance imaging markers of suicide attempt and suicide risk in adolescents

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 April 2015

Petra C. Martin
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry
Thomas J. Zimmer
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry
Lisa A. Pan*
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry
*
*Address for correspondence: Lisa Pan, University of Pittsburgh SOM/WPIC, 3811 O'Hara Street, 100 N. Bellefield Ave., Room 320, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA. (Email: thomasla@upmc.edu)

Abstract

More than 36,000 people in the United States die from suicide annually, and suicide is the third leading cause of death in adolescence. Adolescence is a time of high risk for suicidal behavior, as well as a time that intervention and treatment may have the greatest impact because of structural brain changes and significant psychosocial development during this period. Functional and structural neuroimaging studies in adults who have attempted suicide suggest distinct gray matter volume abnormalities in cortical regions, as well as prefrontal cortical and dorsal anterior cingulate gyrus neural circuitry differences compared with affective and healthy adult controls. Recent functional neuroimaging studies in adolescents with a history of suicide attempt suggest differences in the attention and salience networks compared with adolescents with depression and no history of suicide attempt and healthy controls when viewing angry faces. In contrast, no abnormalities are seen in these areas in the absence of emotional stimuli. These networks may represent promising targets for future neuroimaging studies to identify markers of risk for future suicide attempt in adolescents.

Type
Review Articles
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Web-Based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS). [online]. 2011. Available at http://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/index.html.Google Scholar
2. Lubell, KM, Kegler, SR, Crosby, AE, Karch, D. Suicide trends among youths and young adults aged 10–24 years, United States, 1990–2004. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 2007; 56(35): 905908.Google Scholar
3. Posner, K, Oquendo, MA, Gould, M, Stanley, B, Davies, M. Columbia Classification Algorithm of Suicide Assessment (C-CASA): classification of suicidal events in the FDA’s pediatric suicidal risk analysis of antidepressants. Am J Psychiatry. 2007; 164(7): 10351043.Google Scholar
4. Bridge, JA, Goldstein, TR, Brent, DA. Adolescent suicide and suicidal behavior. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2006; 47(3–4): 372394.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
5. Van Heeringen, K. Stress–Diathesis Model of Suicidal Behavior. In Y. Dwivedi ed. The Neurobiological Basis of Suicide. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press; 2012.Google Scholar
6. Maalouf, FT, Brent, DA. Child and adolescent depression intervention overview: what works for whom and how well? Child Adolesc Psychiatr Clin N Am. 2012; 21(2): 299312.Google Scholar
7. Wagner, G, Koch, K, Schachtzabel, C, Schultz, CC, Sauer, H, Schlösser, RG. Structural brain alterations in patients with major depressive disorder and high risk for suicide: evidence for a distinct neurobiological entity? Neuroimage. 2011; 54(2): 16071614.Google Scholar
8. Monkul, ES, Hatch, MA, Nicoletti, S, et al. Fronto-limbic brain structures in suicidal and non-suicidal female patients with major depressive disorder. Mol Psychiatry. 2006; 12(4): 360366.Google Scholar
9. Altshuler, LL, Casanova, MF, Goldberg, TE, Kleinman, JE. The hippocampus and parahippocampus in schizophrenic, suicide, and control brains. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1990; 47(11): 10291034.Google Scholar
10. Van Heeringen, K, Bijttebier, S, Desmyter, S, Vervaet, M, Baeken, C. Is there a neuroanatomical basis of the vulnerability to suicidal behavior? A coordinate-based meta-analysis of structural and functional MRI studies. Front Hum Neurosci. 2014; 22(8): 824.Google Scholar
11. Steingard, RJ, Renshaw, PF, Hennen, J, et al. Smaller frontal lobe white matter volumes in depressed adolescents. Biol Psychiatry. 2002; 52(5): 413417.Google Scholar
12. MacMaster, FP, Kusumakar, V. Hippocampal volume in early onset depression. BMC Med. 2004; 2(1): 28.Google Scholar
13. Rosso, IM, Cintron, CM, Steingard, RJ, Renshaw, PF, Young, AD, Yurgelun-Todd, DA. Amygdala and hippocampus volumes in pediatric major depression. Biol Psychiatry. 2005; 57(1): 2126.Google Scholar
14. Pan, L, Ramos, L, Segreti, A, Phillips, M, Brent, D. Abnormally diminished right superior temporal gyrus volume in adolescents with a history of suicide attempt. Br J Psychiatry. 2015; 206(4): 339340.Google Scholar
15. Pan, LA, Batezati-Alves, SC, Almeida, JR, et al. Dissociable patterns of neural activity during response inhibition in depressed adolescents with and without suicidal behavior. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2011; 50(6): 602611.Google Scholar
16. Pan, L, Phillips, ML. Toward identification of neural markers of suicide risk in adolescents. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2014; 39(1): 236237.Google Scholar
17. Ehrlich, S, Noam, GG, Lyoo, IK, Kwon, BJ, Clark, MA, Renshaw, PF. White matter hyperintensities and their associations with suicidality in psychiatrically hospitalized children and adolescents. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2004; 43(6): 770776.Google Scholar
18. Ehrlich, S, Noam, GG, Lyoo, IK, Kwon, BJ, Clark, MA, Renshaw, PF. Subanalysis of the location of white matter hyperintensities and their association with suicidality in children and youth. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2003; 1008: 265268.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
19. Oquendo, MA, Placidi, G, Malone, KM, et al. Positron emission tomography of regional brain metabolic responses to a serotonergic challenge and lethality of suicide attempts in major depression. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2003; 60(1): 1422.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
20. Beck, AT, Beck, R, Kovacs, M. Classification of suicidal behaviors, I: quantifying intent and medical lethality. Am J Psychiatry. 1975; 132(3): 285287.Google Scholar
21. Jollant, F, Bellivier, F, Leboyer, M, et al. Impaired decision making in suicide attempters. Am J Psychiatry. 2005; 162(2): 304310.Google Scholar
22. Keilp, JG, Sackeim, HA, Brodsky, BS, Oquendo, MA, Malone, KM, Mann, JJ. Neuropsychological dysfunction in depressed suicide attempters. Am J Psychiatry. 2001; 158(5): 735741.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
23. Pan, LA, Hassel, S, Segreti, AM, Nau, SA, Brent, DA, Phillips, ML. Differential patterns of activity and functional connectivity in emotion processing neural circuitry to angry and happy faces in adolescents with and without suicide attempt. Psychol Med. 2013; 43(10): 21292142.Google Scholar
24. Ham, T, Leff, A, de Boissezon, X, Joffe, A, Sharp, DJ. Cognitive control and the salience network: an investigation of error processing and effective connectivity. J Neurosc. 2013; 33(16): 70917098.Google Scholar
25. Hamza, CA, Stewart, SL, Willoughby, T. Examining the link between nonsuicidal self-injury and suicidal behavior: a review of the literature and an integrated model. Clin Psychol Rev. 2012; 32(6): 482495.Google Scholar
26. Plener, PL, Bubalo, N, Fladung, AK, Ludolph, AG, Lulé, D. Prone to excitement: adolescent females with non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) show altered cortical pattern to emotional and NSS-related material. Psychiatry Res. 2012; 203(2–3): 146152.Google Scholar