{"title":"The course and outcome of eating disorders in adults and in adolescents: a review.","authors":"Martin Fisher","doi":"","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Over 100 studies have been published in the literature to date on the course and outcome of eating disorders. These have generally shown that approximately 50% of patients do well over time, approximately 30% do reasonably well but continue to have symptoms, and approximately 20% do poorly. In this article, the literature on the course and outcome of eating disorders is reviewed from two perspectives. The first is an analysis of studies in adults, looking in depth at a range of issues (weight, eating behaviors, menstrual function, psychosocial functioning, psychosexual function, mortality, bulimia nervosa, long-term follow-up, comorbidity, and prognostic factors) and reviewing the difficulties inherent to the performance of all eating disorders follow-up studies. The second is an analysis of whether adolescents with eating disorders have a better prognosis than adults, as has been considered in the literature. It is concluded that adolescents do, in fact, have a somewhat better prognosis than adults, with the differences seeming to be greater with a longer duration of follow-up.</p>","PeriodicalId":79551,"journal":{"name":"Adolescent medicine (Philadelphia, Pa.)","volume":"14 1","pages":"149-58"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2003-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Adolescent medicine (Philadelphia, Pa.)","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Over 100 studies have been published in the literature to date on the course and outcome of eating disorders. These have generally shown that approximately 50% of patients do well over time, approximately 30% do reasonably well but continue to have symptoms, and approximately 20% do poorly. In this article, the literature on the course and outcome of eating disorders is reviewed from two perspectives. The first is an analysis of studies in adults, looking in depth at a range of issues (weight, eating behaviors, menstrual function, psychosocial functioning, psychosexual function, mortality, bulimia nervosa, long-term follow-up, comorbidity, and prognostic factors) and reviewing the difficulties inherent to the performance of all eating disorders follow-up studies. The second is an analysis of whether adolescents with eating disorders have a better prognosis than adults, as has been considered in the literature. It is concluded that adolescents do, in fact, have a somewhat better prognosis than adults, with the differences seeming to be greater with a longer duration of follow-up.