National Study Gives Parents an Urgent Topic for Discussion

By Kimberly Dennis, M.D.
Medical Director of Timberline Knolls Residential Treatment Center

Would you know if your teen was struggling with an eating disorder? About 525,000 U.S. teenagers are, and many also have other serious emotional health issues, including suicidal thoughts, according to results of a survey of more than 10,000 teens published in the Archives of General Psychiatry. More commonly reported by the teens than anorexia (55,000 teens) or bulimia (170,000 teens) was binge eating disorder (300,000 teens), the symptoms of which may be harder for parents to spot.
The present study is the largest and most comprehensive analysis of eating disorders in the U.S. to date, including nationally representative data on 10,123 teens aged 13 to 18. Binge-eating was the most common disorder, affecting more than 1.6 percent of the teens studied; 0.9 percent suffer bulimia; and 0.3 percent anorexia. Overall, three percent had a lifetime prevalence of one of the disorders. Another three percent experienced troubling symptoms of disordered eating, but not full-fledged eating disorders... Read More