Mayara Leite Alves da Silva, Thiago José Nascimento de Souza, Maykon Wanderley Leite Alves-da-Silva, Carlos Matheus Messias Remigio, Melina Pimentel Cavalcante Pedrosa, Claudio Torres de Miranda, Valfrido Leão de Melo Neto

Key words: fibromyalgia, suicidal ideation, hopelessness, psychache

Objective: Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate if psychache and hopelessness may serve as reliable predictors of suicidal ideation among female fibromyalgia (FM) patients.

Method: This was a cross-sectional study of 50 women with FM, examining the relationship between psychological pain, hopelessness, depressive symptoms, and suicidal ideation. FM diagnosis was confirmed by the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria. Demographic data, the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI 7.0.2), the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II), the Beck Hopelessness Scale (BHS), the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and the Psychache Scale were utilized to assess these relationships and their predictive value for suicidality.

Results: The mean age of the participants was 50.2 years (±8.7). Thirty-two (64%) patients had current major depression, 11 (22%) had bipolar disorder, 20 (40%) presented passive suicidal ideation and 14 (28%) presented active suicidal ideation. Psychological pain correlated with both depressive symptoms (p<0.01; r= 0.648) and hopelessness (p=0.029; r=0.312) but did not predict suicidal ideation. Logistic regression analyses revealed depressive symptom severity as a predictor of passive suicidal ideation (odds ratio = 1.486; 95% CI: 1.017 - 2.170), while hopelessness predicted active suicidal ideation (odd ratio = 1.356; 95% CI, 1.049 – 1.753).

Conclusions: FM female patients showed increased prevalence of suicidal ideation. Hopelessness predicts active suicidal ideation but psychological pain did not serve as predictive factor for suicide ideation among female FM patients.