Joint Heavy use of Alcohol, Cigarettes and Coffee and the Risk of Suicide

Comments on the A. Tanskanen et al report using Finnish cross-sectional surveys in search for putative suicidal indicators; in this case joint heavy use of alcohol, cigarettes & coffee. The present authors note that the suicide rate in the dataset used is higher than in Western populations, which may be a source of bias & a probable limit to generalizability. They apply Tanskanen et al data to standard expressions, calculating sensitivity, specificity & positive predictive value & discuss their findings. (7 refs.)