Bar ends will certainly help- just about anything is better than the hand position you get with flat bars- but I'd change the entire bar to something more suitable. I have one bike with drop bars set reasonably high. The objective was to give more hand positions rather than to bend double.

My other bike has north road bars, which work great for most situations. Your existing brake levers and shifters should swap right over, and you can play around with the height and angle to get a natural hand position.