title: Association between catechol-O-methyltransferase functional polymorphism and male suicide completers.
abstract: Suicide has been suggested to involve catecholaminergic dysfunction and to be related to genetics. Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) 158Val/Met polymorphism (GenBank Accession No. Z26491) is a polymorphism of the gene encoding COMT, a major enzyme in catecholamine inactivation. The COMT 158Val/Met polymorphism affects COMT activity, that is, the alleles encoding Val and Met are associated with relatively high and relatively low COMT activity, respectively. In this study, we hypothesized that the COMT 158Val/Met polymorphism is associated with suicide. The study population consisted of 163 suicide completers (112 males and 51 females). We found that the genotype distribution of the COMT 158Val/Met polymorphism was significantly different between male suicide completers and male controls (p=0.036), while the frequency of the Val/Val genotype, a high-activity COMT genotype, was significantly less in male suicide completers than in male controls (OR: 0.52; 95% CL: 0.31-0.89; p=0.016). However, this was not the case in females. Our results suggest that the Val/Val genotype is a protective factor against suicide in males.
authors.affiliation: Division of Psychiatry and Neurology, Department of Environmental Health and Safety, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Kobe University Graduate School of Medicine, Kobe, Japan.
authors.forename: Hisae
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ono
authors.forename: Osamu
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Shirakawa
authors.forename: Hideyuki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Nushida
authors.forename: Yasuhiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ueno
authors.forename: Kiyoshi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Maeda
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002394:Catechol O-Methyltransferase / Q000235:genetics*; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D005260:Female; D005787:Gene Frequency; D005838:Genotype; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008715:Methionine / Q000235:genetics; D008875:Middle Aged; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D013405:Suicide; D014633:Valine / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D008715:Methionine; D002394:Catechol O-Methyltransferase; D014633:Valine