Celibacy and fertility rates in patients with major affective disorders: the relevance of delusional symptoms and suicidal behaviour

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Abstract
The celibacy and fertility rates of 186 patients with major affective disorders were analysed as a function of the presence or absence of histories of mood congruent delusions or suicidal behaviour in the depressive phases of the disease. Both delusional and suicidal histories were irrelevant to celibacy rates. On the contrary, delusional depressives had a reduced incidence of cases with 2 or more children and suicide attempters had both a lower frequency of high‐fertility cases and a smaller mean number of children than nonattempters. The differences were apparently not attributable to the length of the fertile period of life spent in illness.