More Evidence That Head Injury May Affect Mental Health - KCBD NewsChannel 11 Lubbock

More evidence that a head injury could lead to depression and other mental health problems. This study comes form the University of Iowa where they studied about 100 head injury patients and found a third of them suffered a major bout of depression during the first year after their injury.

Depression and other mood disorders among the brain injury group was much higher when compared to depression rates among the same number of people who had not been injured. Researchers believe the injury causes inflammation or lesions in parts of the brain that control mood. The study suggests that family members should watch for signs of depression and mood disorders in head injury patients, so they can get early treatment.

The study was conducted at the University of Iowa and is published in the archives of General Psychiatry.