Nightmares as predictors of suicide: an extension study including war veterans

Abstract

<p>

</p><p>Nightmares are intensive dreams with negative emotional tone. Frequent nightmares can pose a</p>

<p>serious clinical problem and in 2001, Tanskanen et al. found that nightmares increase the risk of suicide.</p>

<p>However, the dataset used by these authors included war veterans in whom nightmare frequency - and</p>

<p>possibly also suicide risk - is elevated. Therefore, re-examination of the association between nightmares</p>

<p>and suicide in these data is warranted. We investigated the relationship between nightmares and</p>

<p>suicide both in the general population and war veterans in Finnish National FINRISK Study from the</p>

<p>years 1972 to 2012, a dataset overlapping with the one used in the study by Tanskanen et al. Our data</p>

<p>comprise 71,068 participants of whom 3139 are war veterans. Participants were followed from their</p>

<p>survey participation until the end of 2014 or death. Suicides (N = 398) were identified from the National</p>

<p>Causes of Death Register. Frequent nightmares increase the risk of suicide: The result of Tanskanen et al.</p>

<p>holds even when war experiences are controlled for. Actually nightmares are not significantly associated</p>

<p>with suicides among war veterans. These results support the role of nightmares as an independent risk</p>

<p>factor for suicide instead of just being proxy for history of traumatic experiences.</p>