Every day, 23 people in the world — or nearly one every hour — die from the side-effects of eating disorders. At least 30 million people suffer from an eating disorder in the US alone.
Eating disorders are serious and life threatening mental health disorders. And the number of people with eating disorders continue to increase across the globe, said Carine Al Khazen, Vice-President of the Middle East Eating Disorders Association (MEEDA), a non-profit organisation dedicated to raising awareness on eating disorders and providing support to sufferers and their families.
“Eating disorders are on the rise in the world. It is said that that rise is linked to the rise of social media and the rise of diets that have now become the social norm,” said Al Khazen, who is also the director of a specialised Eating Disorder outpatient programme at the American Centre for Psychiatry and Neurology in Dubai.
“Comparison to unrealistic and unreal Photoshopped and airbrushed images of ‘perfect people’ often act as a trigger for vulnerable personalities with predisposed traits like perfectionism, low self esteem, etc. The rise in diets is also parallel to the rise of eating disorders.”
On June 2, the World Eating Disorders Action Day, MEEDA joins the rest of the world to expand global awareness on eating disorders as genetically linked, treatable illnesses that can affect anyone.
“Eating disorders are a serious health concern because they touch the body’s essential functions. Food restriction and starvation, excessive exercise, binging, trying to get rid of the food ingested through unhealthy and dangerous ways and, as consequence, are the deadliest of all mental health disorders with up to 20 per cent of the sufferers dying from the medical complications of their eating disorder,” Al Khazen said.
The disorder does not discriminate. Anyone can be affected regardless of social background, gender, age or race. Sufferers can even have a normal body weight.
All eating disorders start with a diet and between 20 to 25 per cent of dieters will progress to developing a full-blown eating disorder, she explained.
Official figures on the prevalence of eating disorders in the Middle East are scant. However, MEEDA is planning on conducting prevalence studies in Lebanon and the UAE but preliminary studies suggest that the figures are the twice as high as in Europe or the US.
Who's at risk?
A 2012 survey done at Al Ain University said 1.8 per cent of 900 girls aged 13 to 19 were anorexic, compared to just 1 per cent in Britain.
A survey done at Zayed University said nearly one in four of the 228 female students who took part in the survey suffered from abnormal eating attitudes and were at risk of developing eating disorders. Almost three in four were unhappy with their bodies and more than 80 per cent picked thin figures as their ideal body image, Al Khazen said.
“The demographics seem to be also similar to those in the world with up to 95 per cent per cent of the sufferers being females between the ages of 15 to 25 years old. Having said that, there is a rise in early-onset, pre-pubertal anorexia nervosa and we are seeing more and more younger patients. We have many 10-year-old children suffering from anorexia nervosa. It is also rising in woman in their 20s and 30s (post-partum),” she said.
Men also may develop eating disorders but may go undiagnosed due to the stigma of eating disorders being “a woman’s disorder”. Figures show up to 10 million men will suffer from a significant eating disorder at some point in their lives.
This year’s Action Day focuses on the theme ‘Eating Disorders Can’t Afford to Wait!’. This is because early detection and early diagnosis can lead to early treatment which predicts a much better outcome. Anyone reaching a five-year mark with an eating disorder may have severely disabling chronic or fatal illness.
“As a therapist, all cases touch me and suffering is suffering and deserves care. A lot of my patients tell me that they delayed treatment because they thought they weren’t ‘sick enough’ or didn’t have traumatic enough childhoods that could justify having psychological treatments and didn’t feel worthy of care,” Al Khazen said.
“Sufferers either don’t seek help or seek help later which worsens significantly the prognosis of any mental health disorder. So the message is clear: You don’t have to be dying to seek help!”
SOURCE : GULFNEWS