Journal de médecine légale

Suicide Note Analysis: An Aid to Prevention of Suicide

Abstract

Sunil Kumar Duchania and Shweta Garg

Objectives: To improve quality of suicide prevention by means of analysis of suicide notes. Suicide notes or death notes are the last and final words before bidding final goodbye and an important piece of personal evidence in the last stages of life of suicide. Suicide note is one of the most important sources to understand suicide, which may be beneficial in suicide prevention.

Methods: A descriptive study of a total of 10 suicide notes of those individuals who committed suicide and brought for autopsy at the mortuary of Lady Hardinge Medical College.

Results: All suicide notes were handwritten and varied from one page to maximum of 4 pages and majority were in Hindi. The most common age group was 21-30 years, 54% were female. Only 20% of the notes had specific addresses. The main theme was grief and forgiveness in majority of suicide notes and financial crisis the main reason.

Conclusion: Majority of suicide note contained guilt which is strong indicator of possible depression in deceased. Creating awareness about suicide is the need of the hour and this study would be beneficial for developing suicide prevention strategies.