Study highlights risk of eating disorders among teens

Up to 11 per cent of girls and 3 per cent of boys in Ireland are at risk of suffering from an eating disorder, a new study has indicated.

The research, carried out by the Department of Child Psychiatry at University College Dublin and the Lucena Foundation between 2005 and 2007, found that teenagers were more likely to suffer from bulimic tendencies, rather than diet to lose weight.

The findings, which were outlined at the Adolescent Mental Health Conference in UCD today, revealed a third of the teenage girls were dissatisfied with their body shape.

It also indicated that 1.2 per cent of the teenagers were at risk of suffering from anorexia, while 1.5 per cent were at risk of bulimia.

Young people, it said, were more likely to indulge in binge behaviour than starve themselves.

"The Irish group were less likely to diet compared to international norms, but they much more likely to have high scores on bulimia, indicating binge type behaviour such as vomiting after over-eating," said the report's author Professor Fiona McNicholas.

However, she pointed out that about a quarter of the sample size would fall into the overweight and obese category - a risk factor for bulimia - and that bulimia sufferers may have a higher weight than those suffering from anorexia.

Irish teens were also less likely to use exercise to control their weight, despite their obvious concerns about body image.

“The biggest thing with adolescents is that they want to fit in with their peers. Obviously if they feel the pressure to be thin and beautiful aesthetically they are going to continue to try to achieve this unattainable goal and it's the impossibility of that that leads to all the problems," said Prof McNicholas.

She said eating disorders usually begin in adolescence but the associated health problems can continue into later life.

"Because it's often a chronic illness, you find the young person suffers over many years. It is something that we do need to be tackling," she said.

"They have the highest mortality rate of all mental health problems, and that's often frequently forgotten. Half of the mortality rate is down to medical complication, and the other half is a result of dying by suicide. The longer you follow up these children, the higher you find that mortality rate is."

Parents may also be inadvertently affecting their children's perception of eating habits, with those who said they were unhappy about their bodies more likely to have a child that scored in the pathological range for eating disorders.

The treatment of anorexia and bulimia also came under the microscope, with experts pointing out that in-patient treatment is not always the best method of treating these disorders.

Speaking at the conference, Dr Brendan Locke told delegates that the traditional thinking that the parents and family were in some way to blame for eating disorders suffered by their children was wrong, and that families could actually play a greater role in helping to deal with the disorders once they were given the appropriate skills.