Associations of Lifetime Traumatic Brain Injury Characteristics With Prospective Suicide Attempt Among Deployed US Army Soldiers.

TBI history was based on soldiers' recall before deployment, so mild injuries may have been forgotten and injury severity may have been misjudged. The survey did not ask when or why injuries happened, so it cannot separate injuries that occurred during Army service from other lifetime injuries. The analysis looked for risk factors present before deployment, so it did not examine head injuries sustained during or after the index deployment. Self-report and administrative records did not match perfectly, so some attempts may have been missed or not captured. The final analysed sample was 7677 soldiers, while 9949 soldiers were present at baseline. The participants were deployed U.S. Army soldiers. The study found associations, not proof that post-concussive symptoms cause suicide attempts or that treating them would reduce attempts. Suicide attempt was the outcome, not suicide death, and the two have different rates and risk factors.

The supplied text does not report author conflicts of interest. The listed publication types include NIH extramural and U.S. Government non-PHS research support.

Do not conclude that having any lifetime head injury predicts suicide attempt. Any lifetime TBI was not associated with suicide attempt, and the strongest signal came from recent post-concussive symptoms.