BALTIMORE, Jan. 11 About half of burn patients who often undergo years of reconstruction surgery showed signs of clinical depression, says a U.S. study.The finding may not be surprising, but it may be a valuable tool that could spur burn centers to devote more resources to mental healing, according to lead author Brett Thombs, who worked on the study at Johns Hopkins University but is now at McGill University in Montreal.Thomas and colleagues surveyed 224 Johns Hopkins patients who were undergoing reconstruction surgery after being burned -- on average, the patients suffered burns about seven years earlier.Forty-six percent of those surveyed showed signs of mild, moderate or serious depression. Women and those most concerned about their body images were most likely to be depressed, says Thombs.It's normal for burn victims to have trouble adjusting to their condition, Thombs said. I don't think anyone would go through a burn without being horribly sad. It's a very tough adjustment to make.But for those who fail to move through a course of grief and be able to pick themselves up and find their way on their own, he said, they need help of some kind.The findings appear in the January/February issue of the journal General Hospital Psychiatry.Copyright 2007 by UPI
