Distinguishing suicide notes from completed and attempted suicides.

Four experienced raters of suicide notes were unable to distinguish suicide notes from 20 completers and 20 attempters at a level better than chance.

Comparing genuine and simulated suicide notes: a new perspective.

E. S. Shneidman and N. L. Farberow (1957) preselected writers of stimulated suicide notes to eliminate vulnerable subjects. Subsequent comparisons of genuine and stimulated notes have perpetuated the methodological misstep of the original study. In this study, a new set of genuine notes were selected from completed suicides by men and women who left at least one note, who were White, and who were older than 18 years of age. The simulated note writers (SNWs) were unpreselected, unpaid community volunteers. Genuine note writers in the current and 1957 samples were not found to differ; SNWs from the samples did differ. Problems with the interpretation of differences between genuine and simulated notes are discussed, with a focus on the role-playing nature of the simulated notes.

Blood transfusion in orthotopic liver transplantation: six-year experience.

Patients undergoing orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) are susceptible to massive blood loss and require transfusion. Possible reasons for increased transfusion demands include platelet abnormalities, thrombocytopenia secondary to hypersplenism, clotting factor deficiencies, fibrinolysis, increased surgical blood loss associated with portal hypertension and previous surgical procedures, and hypothermia. The purpose of this study was to review trends in blood product usage during our first 6 years of experience performing OLT.