Characteristics of and treatment outcome in inpatients with emetophobia and other specific phobias

Abstract

Emetophobia refers to a fear that oneself or others might vomit and is classified as a specific phobia in current diagnostic manuals. However, it is a relatively unknown and understudied mental disorder. Although it has been speculated that emetophobia might differ from other specific phobias (e.g., in terms of severity), studies on this are virtually non-existent. Thus, this retrospective study analyzed data at admission and discharge from 70 persons with emetophobia and 40 persons with other specific phobias who received a cognitive behavioral therapy-oriented, multimodal inpatient treatment (76.4 % female; mean age 22.7 years, SD = 12.4). Nearly 80 % of persons with emetophobia were female, more than half were adolescents and underweight, and the most common comorbid mental disorders were other anxiety disorders and depression. Compared to inpatients with other specific phobias, persons with emetophobia were younger, had a lower body weight, had higher phobic anxiety, and reported lower life satisfaction at admission. Across both groups, body weight increased with a small effect size and anxiety-related, depressive, and general psychopathology decreased and life satisfaction increased with medium-to-large effect sizes. In conclusion, the current study replicates findings about certain features of persons with emetophobia and is the first study that documents differences between persons with emetophobia and persons with other specific phobias, indicating that emetophobia partially represents a more severe type of specific phobia. Despite these differences, persons with emetophobia and persons with other specific phobias achieve similar and substantial symptom reductions during a multimodal inpatient treatment.