Background: Suicide behavior (SB) has been highly associated with the response to stress and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. The aim of this study was to summarize the results obtained in genetic studies that analyzed the HPA axis-stress pathway and SB through a systematic review.
Methods: We performed an online search in PubMed, EBSCO, Web of Science, Scopus, and PsycoInfo databases up to May 2021. We followed the PRISMA guidelines for systematic reviews. We included case-control and expression studies that provided data on mRNA expression and single-nucleotide polymorphisms of genes associated with SB.
Results: A total of 21,926 individuals participated across 41 studies (not repeats); 34 studies provided data on single-nucleotide polymorphisms in 21,284 participants and 11 studies reported data on mRNA expression in 1034 participants. Ten genes were identified: FKBP5, CRH, CRHBP, CRHR1, CRHR2, NR3C1, NR3C2, SKA2, MC2R, and POMC.
Conclusions: Our findings suggest that key stress pathway genes are significantly associated with SB and show potential as biomarkers for SB.
Keywords: association; genetic; stress; suicide.