Eating Disorders
Eating is controlled by many factors, including appetite, food availability,
family, peer, and cultural practices, and attempts at voluntary control. Dieting
to a body weight leaner than needed for health is highly promoted by current
fashion trends, sales campaigns for special foods, and in some activities and
professions. Eating disorders involve serious disturbances in eating behavior,
such as extreme and unhealthy reduction of food intake or severe overeating, as
well as feelings of distress or extreme concern about body shape or weight.
Researchers are investigating how and why initially voluntary behaviors, such as
eating smaller or larger amounts of food than usual, at some point move beyond
control in some people and develop into an eating disorder. Studies on the basic
biology of appetite control and its alteration by prolonged overeating or
starvation have uncovered enormous complexity, but in the long run have the
potential to lead to new pharmacologic treatments for eating disorders.
Eating disorders are not due to a failure of will or behavior; rather, they
are real, treatable medical illnesses in which certain maladaptive patterns of
eating take on a life of their own. The main types of eating disorders are
anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. A third type, binge-eating disorder, has
been suggested but has not yet been approved as a formal psychiatric diagnosis.
Eating disorders frequently develop during adolescence or early adulthood, but
some reports indicate their onset can occur during childhood or later in
adulthood.
Eating disorders frequently co-occur with other psychiatric disorders such as
depression, substance abuse, and anxiety disorders. In addition, people who
suffer from eating disorders can experience a wide range of physical health
complications, including serious heart conditions and kidney failure which may
lead to death. Recognition of eating disorders as real and treatable diseases,
therefore, is critically important.
Females are much more likely than males to develop an eating disorder. Only
an estimated 5 to 15 percent of people with anorexia or bulimia and an
estimated 35 percent of those with binge-eating disorder are male.
For more, please read the following articles:
Portions of this information has been provided with the kind permission of the National Institutes of Health (www.nih.gov).
Last Editorial Review: 7/7/2004
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