Pain Intensity and Suicidal Ideation of People in Chronic Pain: Mediating Effects of Depression

Abstract

We investigated a potential mediating role of depression between level of pain intensity and suicidal ideation of people who are in chronic pain from nonmalignant illnesses. Participants in this study were 248 patients seeking treatment for chronic pain at the pain center of a university hospital in Korea. Structural equation analyses showed that only the original full mediation model had adequate goodness-of-fit indices for suicidal ideation. Bootstrapping procedures we performed on the original full mediation model yielded a significant mediation effect of depression on suicidal ideation. The findings suggested that intense pain may lead to elevated rates of depression, thereby contributing to an increase in suicidal ideation, rather than playing a role as a direct contributing factor for greater suicidal ideation among people in chronic pain.