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  3. Can you spot whether someone is likely to try to take their own life? Now a blood test could help doctors identify those most at

Can you spot whether someone is likely to try to take their own life? Now a blood test could help doctors identify those most at

admin2016-01-29  11
问题     Can you spot whether someone is likely to try to take their own life? Now a blood test could help doctors identify those most at risk. Chemicals in the blood may provide a much-needed clue. Alexander Niculescu of Indiana University in Indianapolis and his colleagues have developed a questionnaire and blood test that together predicted with 92 percent accuracy who among a group of 108 men receiving psychiatric treatment would develop suicidal feelings over the next year. Preliminary evidence suggests the test also works for women.
    Because only about 16 in every 100,000 people end their own lives, a test with such a level of accuracy will give many false positive and false negative results if used on the general population. But it could prove useful for people who are already having psychiatric care, especially those who are addicted to drugs, incarcerated or have a family history of suicide, all of which are known suicide risk factors.
    Although many factors like these are identified after a person kills himself, none are predictive. While 90 percent of people who kill themselves have been diagnosed with depression, only 2 percent of people with depression kill themselves.
    A test that can spot suicidal intentions without relying on self-disclosure would help doctors to start preventative measures, such as putting someone on suicide watch. This typically involves preventing someone from leaving hospital, confiscating potentially hazardous items and continually monitoring behavior. Research shows that suicide attempters can be dissuaded from trying again, so the test might tell who could benefit from receiving such intervention before they have even tried to take their life.
    To develop the test, over several years Niculescu’s team took blood samples from 217 men undergoing various psychiatric treatments. They compared changes in gene expression in 37 of them who developed suicidal feelings with previously published work and with post-mortem samples of 26 men who had killed themselves. They identified 11 gene changes that could be biological markers for spotting people who might be considering suicide, and they monitored these same markers in a test group of 265 men with psychiatric conditions.
    Niculescu’s test has already proved successful where it would be used most—in hospitals. There, people are at a higher risk of suicide than the general population. Niculescu and his team found the test was especially predictive for people with bipolar disorder, predicting with 98 percent accuracy which of them would develop suicidal thoughts, and with 94 percent accuracy who would make an attempt serious enough to require hospitalization. " It could be used as a screening instrument," says Niculescu. If somebody scored highly, they could be followed more closely, be hospitalised longer, their medications added or changed. "
According to the author, the blood test method is______.
选项 A、accurate
B、predictive
C、generally applicable
D、misleading
答案B
解析 推断题。根据题干定位到第一段。关键句：Now a blood test could help doctors identifythose most at risk．Chemicals in the blood may provide a much-needed clue．由risk和clue可知，血液测试这种方法是一种前瞻性的手段，具有预测性，[B]选项正确。[A]选项“准确”，显然与第二段a test with such a level of accuracy will give many false positive and false negative resultsif used on the general population的表述不符，可排除，同理可排除[C]选项。[D]选项观点在原文中并未体现，故可排除。
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