3.3. Thematic analysis of suicide note content
Five actual suicide notes were available in the coronial records.
The content of another 39 suicide notes was quoted/paraphrased
in the coronial judgement. Therefore, the content of a total of 44
suicide notes was available for thematic analysis. (For the
remaining 43 cases, the discovery of “a suicide note” was mentioned
in the coronial records but the content was not elaborated
on.)The final sample included suicide notes written by 13 females,
30 males and a couple who jointly signed one note. The demographics
and clinical factors of these 45 individuals did not differ
significantly from the individuals whose suicide notes were not
available for analysis, except a lower than expected number of
people with terminal illness (χ2¼4.8; p¼0.028). Four major
themes emerged from the thematic analysis (Table 2). Some
details have been blanked out to preserve confidentiality.