WEDNESDAY, May 19 (HealthDay News) -- Baseline pessimism and optimism are not associated with patient satisfaction with facial plastic surgery, and those treated for depression show greater satisfaction than patients not treated for depression, according to research published in the May/June issue of the Archives of Facial Plastic Surgery.
Jill L. Hessler, M.D., of Premier Plastic Surgery in Palo Alto, Calif., and colleagues examined the answers of 51 facial plastic surgery patients who filled out a survey on demographics and baseline levels of optimism/pessimism as well as a surgery-specific questionnaire preoperatively and four to six months postoperatively.
The researchers found that patients over the mean age of 53 were more satisfied with the results of their surgery than younger patients (P=.01), and that those currently being treated for depression were more satisfied than those not being treated (P=.05). They did not identify a correlation between baseline optimism/pessimism or other baseline factors and patients' perceptions of surgical outcomes.
"Despite a priori hypotheses that patients treated for depression might be more pessimistic and rate their satisfaction lower than other patients, patients treated for depression show a trend toward greater satisfaction from facial plastic surgical procedures than those not treated for depression," the authors conclude.
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