TALKING therapy can prevent people bent on suicide from stepping over the brink, a study has found.

Six to 10 counselling sessions reduced suicide deaths by more than a quarter in a group of Danish men and women who had already tried to kill themselves.

Five years after the course of treatment ended, there were 26 per cent fewer suicides among those who had undergone therapy compared with those who had not.

Study leader Dr Annette Erlangsen, from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in the US, said: "Now we have evidence that psychosocial treatment - which provides support, not medication - is able to prevent suicide in a group at high risk of dying by suicide."

The researchers analysed Danish health data on more than 65,000 people who attempted suicide between January 1 1992 and December 31 2010.

Of that group, 5,678 individuals received psychosocial therapy at one of eight suicide prevention clinics in Denmark.

Their outcomes were compared with those of 17,304 people who had attempted suicide but not received therapy.

The findings of the study are published online in the journal The Lancet Psychiatry.