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First National Survey on Eating Disorders Finds Binge Eating More Common Than Other Eating Disorders

Posted on: Thursday, 1 February 2007, 00:00 CST

The first national survey of individuals with eating disorders shows that binge eating disorder is more prevalent than either anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa. The study, conducted by researchers at Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital, also calls binge eating disorder a "major public health burden" because of its direct link to severe obesity and other serious health effects. "For the first time, we have nationally representative data on eating disorders. These data clearly show that binge eating disorder is the most common eating disorder," says lead author James I. Hudson, MD, ScD, director of the Psychiatric Epidemiology Research Program at McLean Hospital and professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

The study, published in the current issue of Biological Psychiatry, is based on data obtained over two years in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication (NCS-R), a survey of more than 9,000 people from across the United States about their mental health. Ronald C. Kessler, PhD, principal investigator of the NCS-R, and Eva Hiripi, of Harvard Medical School, and Harrison Pope Jr., MD, director of McLean Hospital's Biological Psychiatry Laboratory, are co-authors of the paper.

The survey found that 0.9 percent of women and 0.3 percent of men reported having anorexia nervosa at some point in their lives, and that 1.5 percent of women and 0.5 percent of men reported having bulimia nervosa. By contrast, binge eating disorder, a condition in which individuals experience frequent uncontrolled eating binges without purging, afflicts 3.5 percent of women and 2 percent of men at some point in their lives.

"Everybody knows about anorexia and bulimia; however, binge eating disorder affects more people, is often associated with severe obesity and tends to persist longer,'' Hudson says. "The consequences of binge eating disorder can be serious--including obesity, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and stroke. It is imperative that health experts take notice of these findings."

The survey also found that the average lifetime duration of anorexia was 1.7 years, compared to 8.3 years for bulimia and 8.1 years for binge eating disorder. "Contrary to what people may believe, anorexia is not necessarily a chronic illness; in many cases, it runs its course and people get better without seeking treatment. So our survey suggests that for every one severe case [of anorexia], there may be many other milder cases."

The survey calls for further study of why some individuals with anorexia are able to recover more quickly and why others are crippled by the illness, say Hudson and Pope. "If we identified the factors that allowed people to recover from eating disorders quicker than others, then we might be better able to prevent the chronic, severe cases."

The findings, say Hudson and Pope, offer additional scientific support for including the diagnosis of binge eating disorder as an official psychiatric diagnosis in the next edition of the American Psychiatric Association's "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders."

U.S. News & World Report consistently ranks McLean Hospital the nation's top psychiatric hospital. McLean is an affiliate of Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, and a member of Partners HealthCare.

The following experts on eating disorders, who are aware of the survey's findings but are not associated with it, have agreed to be contacted by members of the media for comment:

Cynthia M. Bulik, PhD, FAED

William and Jeanne Jordan Distinguished Professor of

Eating Disorders

Department of Psychiatry, School of Medicine

Professor of Nutrition, School of Public Heath

Director, UNC Eating Disorders Program

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Phone: (919) 843 1689

e-mail: cbulik@med.unc.edu

or

Ruth Striegel-Moore, Ph.D.

Walter A. Crowell University Professor of Social Sciences and Professor of Psychology

Wesleyan University

Phone: 860-685-2328.

rstriegel@wesleyan.edu

or

Joel Yager, MD

Professor and Vice Chair for Education and Academic Affairs

Department of Psychiatry

University of New Mexico School of Medicine

phone: 505-272-5416

jyager@unm.edu

or

Marc Lerro, Executive Director

Eating Disorders Coalition for Research, Policy & Action

Washington DC 20003-4303

Phone: 202-543-9570

www.eatingdisorderscoalition.org

Source: Business Wire

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