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Could suicide risk be ID'd through a blood test? New Ottawa research chair offers hope

The emails started arriving soon after a press release went out heralding the stunning research findings, led by young molecular biologist Zachary Kaminsky.

“A blood test for suicide?” was the headline on the release issued by Johns Hopkins University’s school of medicine in 2014. It explained that Kaminsky and other researchers at the Baltimore institution had discovered a chemical alteration in a gene called SKA2 linked to stress reduction. That finding could help doctors predict and prevent suicide through a blood test.

The experience is not one that could be easily forgotten. It has helped drive Kaminsky, now 40, to work toward a game-changing goal of not only predicting suicide risk with a simple blood or saliva test, but preventing it by using some of the biomarkers identified in his lab.

It is a goal he brings to Ottawa, as the newly appointed Suicide Prevention Research Chair at The Royal.

Richardson, who was part of the Royal selection committee that hired Kaminsky, said she was looking for “hope” in the research that will result.

Kaminsky’s work brings promise for the kind of hope that has long eluded the world of suicide prevention.

He believes that, within a matter of years, a clinical test will exist that could save lives by predicting suicide risk.

“We have a chance with biomarkers to do good in the very near future, I think. That’s my life’s goal — to see some of the biomarkers identified in my lab being used to save people.”

At the heart of his research is epigenetics, the study of chemical modifications to DNA that act like a light switch. Genes can get turned on and off by epigenetic factors, which is what Kaminsky studies on a molecular level.

His research has helped identify biomarkers that indicate a high risk for postpartum depression and another that points to a high risk of suicide. The gene that is associated with a higher risk of suicide works as a kind of “brake pad” for stress response. If the brake pad is thinner, because lower amounts of the gene are being made, it doesn’t work as well in responding to stress.

Being able to diagnose a predisposition to suicide also raises ethical questions, given existing stigma around mental illness. As a start, he said, a test would have to be extremely accurate to limit false positives.


Once researchers can more accurately predict who is at the highest suicide risk, “we can start to think about looking at interventions.” He suggested the military might be an obvious place to put resulting diagnostics to work.


The biological approach to identifying and treating mental illness resonates with the public and helps reduce stigma, he said, a lesson he carries from the many emails he received.


“When we point out mental illness is linked to the DNA, it makes it poignantly real. This isn’t something in your head. Like heart disease, it is a real disease.”

http://calgaryherald.com/news/local-...9-1012afaad99b