Clinical and sociodemographic characteristics associated with suicidal ideation in depressed outpatients.

OBJECTIVE: To identify clinical and sociodemographic characteristics associated with suicidal ideation (SI) among patients seeking care for depression in routine primary and psychiatric care settings. CONCLUSIONS: Consistent with past findings, increased rates of SI were associated with greater depressive symptom severity as well as other features suggestive of severity of illness. Our results confirm previous findings of associations between SI and panic and (or) phobic symptoms and anxiety, but did not confirm previous findings of an association between SI and alcohol or drug use and (or) dependence. While selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor monotherapy appeared significantly helpful in reducing SI during the course of treatment, the presence of SI at baseline was found to be a associated with decreased treatment response, with patients reporting SI at the start of treatment being less likely to achieve remission.

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