Studying suicide notes can help with prevention, research suggests

Powerlessness, battling with mental illness and self-blame are common themes found in suicide notes, according to a study from Canadian researchers that recommends health-care professionals target those issues in treatment and prevention programs.

The research, published this week in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, aimed to find patterns of thinking that contribute to suicide and make recommendations to target those patterns in treatment.

“We know a lot about peoples’ experiences with suicide, but it’s very rare to be able to get into a unique window into the mindset of people who die by suicide,” said Dr. Juveria Zaheer, who co-authored the study.

The study, conducted by researchers at CAMH and the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, examined 290 suicide notes that were then narrowed down to 36 notes that explicitly referenced mental illness and mental health care.

The notes were from suicide cases that occurred between 2003 and 2009 and were reported to the Office of the Chief Coroner for Ontario, the study said.

About 90 per cent of people who die by suicide have been diagnosed with a mental illness, Zaheer said.

Dr. Zainab Furqan, who also co-authored the study, said the research aimed to explore how mental illness and mental health care was described by those who died by suicide.

The study found that feelings of powerlessness were commonly expressed in the notes.Others wrote that they were angry that they couldn’t make any progress in treating their illness.