Overview: psychiatric sequelae to multiple trauma.

The authors discuss the setting, patients, and staff, and the role of psychiatric consultants in intensive care units and trauma centers. They point out the similarities and differences between patients with multiple trauma and those who have had open-heart surgery and head or spinal cord injuries. They also deal with the question of an element of self-destructive behavior in accidents and offer suggestions for the psychiatric management of severely traumatized patients. The authors conclude that the role and obligation of the psychiatrist of the the future will lie in crisis intervention within the medical-biological model.