The authors retrospectively evaluated 88 patients diagnosed with bipolar I, bipolar II, or unipolar depression. Of these, 44 had made at least one suicide attempt. They were matched for age, gender, & diagnosis with 44 patients who had never attempted suicide. In the univariate contrasts, suicidal patients were more likely to be male, single, ill for a long period of time, bipolar, substance abusing, & unemployed. In logistic regression analysis, only length of illness & unemployment were statistically significant. (30 refs.)