Association Between Folic Acid Prescription Fills and Suicide Attempts and Intentional Self-harm Among Privately Insured US Adults.

ABSTRACT:

Importance

Suicide is a leading cause of death in the United States, having increased more than 30% from 2000 to 2018. An inexpensive, safe, widely available treatment for preventing suicidal behavior could reverse this trend.

Objective

To confirm a previous signal for decreased risk of suicide attempt following prescription fills for folic acid in a national pharmacoepidemiologic study of patients treated with folic acid.

Design, setting, and participants

A within-person exposure-only cohort design was used to study the dynamic association between folic acid (vitamin B9) prescription fills over a 24-month period and suicide attempts and intentional self-harm. Data were collected from a pharmacoepidemiologic database of US medical claims (MarketScan) for patients with

SUBMITTER: Gibbons RD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9520442 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature