The Role of Psychological Factors (Anxiety, Depression, Social Support, and Coping Skills) on Predicting Suicide Ideation in Patients with Multiple Sclerosis.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a widespread autoimmune disease, and more than two million people in the world are affected. Compared to healthy individuals, these patients seem to have a higher universality of suicide. We aimed to assess the universality of suicide ideation in patients diagnosed with MS and find out the role of psychological factors which include anxiety, depression, social support, and coping on suicide ideation in MS patients in this study.  167 patients with a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis from Khatam hospital in Zahedan southeast Iran participated in this cross-sectional study.

The self-reports scales are fulfilled by patients including the beck anxiety inventory,  beck depression inventory, The Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support and coping response inventory, and the beck scale for suicide ideation. Pearson correlation coefficients and the Linear Regression model were included in the statistical analysis. Between suicide ideation with depression, anxiety, social support, and several attacks, significant correlations were identified. Social support, depression, anxiety, and coping can predict 35% of the variation in suicide ideation as the regression analysis has shown. Depression has a higher effect on suicide ideation (R²=0.34) based on these predictors. Multiple sclerosis patients have high suicidal ideation. The identified risk factors aid in helping personnel to recognize endangered patients and avert suicide. Comprehensive suicide prevention efforts might consist of more research on protective and risk factors.