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Archive for the ‘Eating Disorders’ Category

Personnel suffering from eating disorders have more than a few options in seeking treatment, once they identify and admit they have a disease. According to the Center for Eating Disorders and Psychotherapy in Worthington, the best selection is family and friends.

Even as many females suffer at from anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating in any case one during their lifetime, what manifests the intermittent bouts with one of these disorders into a full-blown disease is still the subject of much debate.

Many hospitals provide a service where people can take part in treatment ranging beginning meetings with professionals to inpatient treatment. Depending on the intensity of the disease and the readiness of the patient to participate, determines which treatment option is utilized.

The National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) is the considered to be the biggest non-profit organization in the United States and works to put a stop to eating problem as also to provide referrals to patients suffering from anorexia, bulimia as well as binge eating disorders and, as well people who are taken up with body image and issues pertaining to weight.

The ultimate goal of the association is to eliminate eating disorders and to achieve this, the association has committed itself to expanding the public understanding of this disease as well as enchanting preventive measures and promoting way in to quality treatment for those who have been afflicted with eating problem as well as giving support to families through education, advocacy and in research.

The association tries to provide the needs of the national community in the course of programs that it provides, as well as products and services that are of superior quality in sustaining the elimination of eating problem. In order to make the mission become more fruitful and productive it has developed prevention programs for a large many different audiences, and has published and circulated educational materials in addition to operating the country’s first toll-free helpline for eating disorders information as well as referral.

Help Must be Sought After in Order for it to Work

One of the toughest parts of having someone seek out help at a Center for Eating Disorders is their capability to recognize that they are suffering from a serious illness. Anorexia nervosa sufferers generally don’t see anything wrong with how they look. Their fear of gaining weight is more often than not unfounded, that may not be the image they see when they look into a mirror.

There are many times when an intervention with family and friends may be essential before a person with anorexia or bulimia be converted into willing to accept that a problem exists and seek treatment. Nevertheless, an intervention should not be staged without the benefit of advice from a professional.

How and Where can I Contact an Eating Disorder Association?

One of the best way to find an association that is near to you is by using the Internet, since the speed and efficiency of the Internet will allow you to be able to quickly and easily find accurately what you are looking for, and thus will narrow down your search dramatically.

Keep in mind not to get frustrated in your search, and remember that seeking help is significant and that you should not feel ashamed or disappointed in yourself for doing so. You should understand that there are many people out there who are suffering just as you are, and so you should by no means feel alone. Recovery is a serious and decisive step in you getting better.

The prevalence of eating disorder cases as well as its awareness has increased dramatically recently. They are mental disorders that cause a person to experience obsessions and compulsions around their body and food. People suffering from these disorders struggle with distorted body perception and are unable to see themselves or their body accurately. Often they use eating-disorder behaviors to increase the perception of control over emotions and life experiences. The most common types of eating disorders are anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating disorder.

Eating Disorders Require Immediate Attention

Eating-disorders require treatment as soon as they are diagnosed. Due to the shame surrounding the disorder, the person typically hides the disorder and protects the addiction at all costs. This may make accurate diagnosis and treatment difficult. Intervention by family and friends is often necessary to help a person seek treatment. Due to the drastic health implications and life threatening situations that can arise out of this, treatment must be thorough and comprehensive.

Receive Care in Dedicated Anorexia and Bulimia Treatment Centers

There are numerous anorexia and bulimia treatment centers with the increase in the occurrence and diagnosis of such troubles. These centers have a team of specialists who work along with the affected people to provide compassionate care. Treatment must include medical and weight stabilization along with psychotherapy, as the underlying causes of these disorders must be explored and resolved. A nutritionist helps implement the appropriate nutrition needed and the body weight is restored to normal with proper eating habits. Both individual and group therapy are aspects of the treatment programs and help to re-establish the person into life and relationships.

At one time, cognitive-behavioral therapy was considered to be the gold standard in the treatment of bulimia and binge eating disorder. In 1993, Stuart Agras, a prominent researcher from Stanford University, investigated the current treatment of binge eating, posing two complex questions. The first was whether some treatments were better than others or whether all treatments were equally effective. The second question was whether treatments provided specific or nonspecific effects and whether they worked by the same or different processes.

Agras emphasized the importance of learning which factors maintain binge eating and in which way a specific therapy influenced these factors. He discussed the variation in assessment methods that made comparisons between and across studies extremely difficult. He found that studies differed in diagnostic criteria, outcome criteria, and length of follow-up intervals. Agras (1993) found that only 32 patients out of every 100 entering treatment emerged eating disorder free 1 year or later.

Researchers performed a 2- to 9-year follow-up study on 52 women with the diagnosis of bulimia nervosa according to the DSM-III-R. The patients were treated in an inpatient eating disorders unit at a university hospital, using behavioral methods to address eating behaviors, individual psychotherapy, pharmacotherapy (if indicated), group therapy, and family therapy. Of the 52 women, 46 women were interviewed, 1 had died, and 5 could not be located. Of the 46 inpatient bulimic women, 39 percent had fully recovered and 41 percent were still symptomatic. The longer period of time after discharge, the greater percentage of patients recovered. At the end of year one, 15 percent had recovered versus 67 percent at the end of year 8. They found that the mean duration of recovery was more than two years.

Another group in 1999 found the same results as the previous group in that the number of women who were symptomatic for bulimia nervosa declined as the length of time post-treatment increases. Researchers strictly defined eating disorder outcome with both narrow and broad definitions. The narrow definition required a subject to be free of bulimic symptomotology for a period of six months, and in addition, for the subject not to use body weight and shape as a way of judging herself. The broad definition required the subject to be free of disordered eating behaviors for at least eight weeks with no restrictions on self-evaluation of perceived weight and shape.

Women who had not met criteria for full remission but who no longer met DSM-IV criteria were considered to be in partial remission. The researchers had a group of 173 women, with a mean duration of follow-up of 11.5 +/- 1.9 years.

This is the longest follow-up period in the English language literature on bulimia nervosa with the second largest sample size. At follow-up, one patient (0.6 percent) met full diagnostic criteria for anorexia nervosa and 19 women (11 percent) met clinical diagnostic criteria for bulimia nervosa. Thirty-two women (18.5 percent) met the criteria for ED NOS, including one woman with Binge Eating Disorder. When researchers reported the results according to the narrow definition of remission, they found that 28.3 percent of the women were in partial remission at follow-up and 41.6 percent were in full remission. When they reported the results according to the broad definition of remission, they found that 23.1 percent were in partial remission, and 46.8 percent were in complete remission.

Five short-term studies in which patients were followed for a year or more after treatment found that most patients do well at one year after treatment with at least 75 percent showing no bulimic symptoms. In six studies where patients have been followed for up to two years or more, about one-half of the patients were in remission at follow-up. It was concluded that 50 percent of bulimia nervosa patients were symptom free two to ten years after intake, that about 20 percent of patients remained persistently symptomatic, and that the remainder (about 30 percent) have a course of illness characterized by remissions and relapses or by persistent bulimic behavior that does not meet clinical definition.

In 1997, Fichter and Quadflieg, a pair of German researchers who are two of the best in the field, published the results of their 6-year long-term study of bulimia nervosa. They studied a group of 196 female patients who fulfilled the diagnostic criteria according to the DSM-IV for bulimia nervosa. The treatment they received focused on biological, social, and psychological perspectives. They assessed the patients pre-treatment, post-treatment, at 2-year follow-up and at 6-year follow-up. Treatment lasted for 95.5 +/- 43 days; upon admission, patients ranged 25.6 +/- 6.7 years of age; and patients had had bulimia nervosa for 8.1 +/- 4.9 years. At treatment discharge, 47 patients (24.1 percent) were significantly improved, 77 (39.5 percent) were markedly improved, 60 (30.8 percent) were slightly improved, and nine (4.6 percent) were unchanged, one patient (0.5 percent) was somewhat worse, and another one (0.5 percent) as decidedly worse.

Fichter and Quadfliegs data show that patients substantially improve during inpatient treatment, show a slight decline during the next 2 years and show further improvement until the last assessment at 6 years. They state that the longer the follow-up time, the number of recovered patients increases and mortality increases (6-year mortality for bulimia nervosa is 1.1 percent).

The 6-year outcome study based on the presence or absence of a clinical eating disorder showed a relatively favorable course in the treatment of bulimia nervosa. This study counted only the presence or absence of a full clinical diagnosis so it missed some of the sub-syndromal behaviors. The researchers presented the multidimensional data at four distinct points of time. The study showed that 59.9 percent of women participating in the study had a good outcome, 29.4 percent an intermediate outcome, 9.6 percent a poor outcome, and 1.1 percent were deceased. However, of the 133 females with no DSM-IV eating disorder at 6 year follow-up, 25 still showed marked symptoms, 26 had experienced no partial remission (or were unchanged), 45 showed residual symptoms, and 37 were rated as usual self (or were eating disorder free).

It is interesting to note that the above outcome studies do not remark upon what the clients were doing all of these years. Were they in outpatient treatment? Were they in individual psychotherapy for part of the time? Did they outgrow the disorder, indicating a maturation effect? More complete outcome studies are needed to further refine outcome research.

Today eating disorder is one of the major health issues that the world population is facing. Millions of people from every age group are facing this health problem. As per latest statistics nearly around 10% of all eating disorder cases are reported to take place in young children who are 10 years old or less, and 86% of the cases are reported in individuals who are 20 years and older. Moreover, according to recent studies, it is even estimated that the number of people suffering from eating disorder is three times as much as the number of people currently living with AIDS. Many experts also believe that this statistic may vary because many men with eating disorders are not accurately diagnosed. Definitely these are few alarming indications that cannot be ignored.

Eating disorders are about much more than food and weight. They stem from multifaceted psychological issues. In fact eating disorders may have life-threatening physical and emotional consequences. Today if we carefully study the current scenario then we can see that eating disorders, such as compulsive or binge eating, anorexia and bulimia has widely affected millions of people in every walk of life. It is more kind of psychiatric illnesses and addictive disorders that has affected many people across the globe.

Thousands of people die every year from the physical problems caused by eating disorders. Most sufferers never seek eating disorder treatment and those who attempt to control eating disorders usually follows procedures like dieting, fasting, over-exercising, laxatives or using simple pills. These strategies can produce short term control, but they do not provide an answer to eating disorders and can often make things even worse. However, with the right type of eating disorder treatment, people can get well and gradually learn to eat normally again. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is just one of the few treatment procedures that follow a psychotherapeutic approach and aims to control dysfunctional emotions, behaviors through a goal-oriented and organized procedure.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is a type of psychotherapy that generally gives emphasis to the vital role of thinking in what we do and how we feel. It is primarily based on the idea that our thoughts affect our feelings and behaviors. Focusing on this prime fact, therapists try to help people in re-shaping their feelings about food and bodies so that suffer can make healthy choices instead of disordered ones. As Therapists follow a psychotherapeutic approach, they try to learn what their clients want out of life. During this eating disorder treatment procedure, therapist’s role is to listen, educate and encourage, while the client’s roles is to convey concerns, learn and execute that learning.

It is important to understand that eating disorder is not just associated with eating habits or diet. It is connected with many other factors, including society, family or psychological issues and cognitive behavior therapy touches on all of these factors. Many people from all across the world who have effectively recovered from eating disorders through this behavioral therapy state that their sessions actually helped them attach with their emotions. They learned a good attitude toward eating and improved their self esteem. They learned how to eradicate pessimistic thought patterns and turn them into an optimistic voice.

Today, it has achieved wide popularity both for therapists and consumers. However to make cognitive-behavioral therapy more effective, be sure you work together with your counselor toward on common goals. It is just like an active type of counseling.

Eating disorder is getting prevalent in the cities of today. We may call it as psychiatric disorder. It is caused mostly by no regular exercise, no control over consumption of food and eating junk foods containing high calories and cholesterol. Because of these habits people also suffer some serious problems like blood pressure, diabetes other than eating disorder.

Most of the people assume that eating disorders occurs in peoples with excessive weight only but the fact is average weight people can also face these types of problem. Depression can also lead to eating diseases; in fact it is the main cause of binge eating disorder.

Symptoms of Eating Disorders:

Eating disorders are prevalent in many types –
Binge eating disorder Compulsive overeating Bulimia Anorexia nervosa Diabulmia Night eating syndrome Orthorexia nervosa Pica Rumination Starvation diet Anorexia

The most common are:

Binge eating disorder: – Can’t stop to eat, eat without checking there profit and loss Because of this behavior people also suffer some serious problems like eating disorder.

Eats until physically uncomfortable Periodically does not exercise to control over consumption of food Often eats alone during periods of normal eating, owing to feelings of embarrassment about food Eats an unusually large amount of food at one time — more than a normal person would eat in the same amount of time. Eats much more quickly during binge episodes than during normal eating episodes Eats large amounts of food even when they are not really hungry Usually eats alone during binge eating episodes in order to avoid discovery of the disorder Feels disgusted, depressed, or guilty after binge eating
Compulsive overeating – Overeating or addiction of over eating is called compulsive overeating. People suffering from their abnormal eating, feels uncomfortable in society. Compulsive Overeater is at risk for a heart attack, high blood-pressure and cholesterol, kidney disease and/or failure, arthritis and bone deterioration, and stroke.

Bulimia :- Bulimia nervosa, known as bulimia, is an eating disorder and psychological condition in which the subject engages in recurrent binge eating followed by feelings of guilt, depression, and self-condemnation and intentional purging to compensate for the excessive eating, usually to prevent weight gain. Purging can take the form of vomiting, fasting, inappropriate use of laxatives, enemas, diuretics or other medication, or excessive physical exercise.

Night eating syndrome: – Night eating syndrome is an eating disorder this is an ongoing, persistent behavior, unlike the occasional late snack or skipped meal that most people have from time to time. In fact, people with this disorder are often unaware of their nocturnal meals, although some feel they won’t be able to sleep without eating first.

Eating Disorder Prevention Tips

Make your whole life better through food and eating Dieting is about losing some weight in a healthy way so how you feel on the outside will match how good you already feel inside. Convinced your self-esteem is hinged on what you weigh and how you look Attempt to control your weight a bit better Control your life and emotions through food/lack of food — and are a huge neon sign saying “look how out of control I really feel” Everything gets going in life — stress, coping, pain, anger, acceptance, validation, confusion, fear — cleverly hidden behind phrases like “I’m just on a diet”