Nightmares and suicide: predicting risk in depression

There is growing evidence of an association of a number of subjective and objective sleep parameters (especially nightmares) and elevated suicidal risk in different clinical populations as well as in the general populations. This is a cross-sectional naturalistic study of 52 inpatients (28 females and 24 males, aged from 24 to 75 years) meeting criteria for a current depressive episode within Recurrent Depressive Disorder (RDD) or Bipolar Disorder (BD) according to ICD-10. All patients were evaluated with the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS), followed by a direct interview about their dreams' content and emotional charge, as well as about suicidal thoughts and plans or previous attempts. Patients with RDD suffered significantly more frequently from nightmares than those with BD, p