What is the prevalence of Eating Disorders?

Eating behavior disorders or TCA are more common than we think, and surely they are more than what the experts themselves have recorded. The best known are bulimia and anorexia nervosa, along with binge eating disorder, all disorders in which an unhealthy relationship with food develops.

Since the problem is related to food, TCAs are extremely dangerous for the medical health of those affected. Physical symptoms range from extreme thinness and malnutrition to morbid obesity and associated problems, with a high mortality rate from medical complications.

Next we are going to know a few data on the prevalence of eating disorders in Spain and worldwide, discovering a few details of the age groups in which they appear the most.

• Related article: "Why are Eating Disorders so dangerous?"

What are TCAs?

Eating behavior disorders or TCA are mental disorders whose central problem involves pathological behavior with food.

The patient presents concern about her weight, body image and eating, developing a pathological relationship with food both in the form of addiction to it and total avoidance. Whether eating large amounts of food or eating nothing at all, the physical health of the patient suffers, developing medical problems ranging from morbid obesity to malnutrition. TCAs have a high mortality rate.

Despite their extreme severity, eating disorders are treatable and the person who undergoes psychotherapy can improve enormously, fighting against his unhealthy relationship with the food and overcoming both his fear of gaining weight and learning not to use food as a tool to manage his emotions. To achieve this, it is essential that their family and friends give them support, in addition to receiving the help multidisciplinary group of doctors, nurses, nutritionists, psychologists and psychiatrists specialized in TCA.

The most important TCAs

Before introducing data on the prevalence of eating disorders, we must first know which are the main ones. Although several eating disorders have been proposed in diagnostic manuals, it is assumed that there are mainly three: anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder.

1. anorexia nervosa

Anorexia nervosa is characterized by a pathological fear of gaining weight., which manifests itself in the form of poor food intake. This causes the person with anorexia to lose weight drastically, reaching extreme thinness and malnutrition, but since a distorted self-image and perceives herself as fat, continues to eat little or nothing, and has little awareness of how thin she is is.

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2. bulimia nervosa

Binge eating can be seen in bulimia nervosa, episodes in which the patient eats large amounts of food as a coping mechanism for negative emotions, with little or no control to stop them. The problem is that these binges do not help him feel better, quite the contrary, because after doing them, he deeply regrets what he has done in fear of gaining weight. To make amends for what he has done, the person with bulimia purges (p. g., vomiting, using laxatives or diuretics), fasting, and compulsive exercise.

It differs from anorexia because the patient actually eats and, despite binge eating and subsequent purges, you have eating habits stable enough to be able to maintain a weight normal. Even some people with bulimia nervosa are overweight.

The key to this disorder is binge eating and subsequent purging, not the patient's body mass index, although this may also be of some concern to the affected person.

• Related article: "Bulimia Nervosa: The Binge Eating and Vomiting Disorder"

3. Binge eating disorder

The Binge eating disorder, as its name suggests, is characterized by episodes of binge eating. As with bulimia, the patient eats large amounts of food to manage negative emotions, but it differs from bulimia in that there are no purges or ways to counteract the enormous amount of calories ingested. As a consequence, many patients with binge eating disorder are morbidly obese. It is usually called food addiction.

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What is the real prevalence of eating disorders?

Knowing the exact prevalence of eating disorders is complicated, if not impossible. It is very difficult to have access to exact data on the number of people who are fighting against an ATT in order to calculate its true scope. Many people with anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating disorder do not seek treatment or are never diagnosed, both due to ignorance of the disorder and denial.

In some lucky cases, the disorder improves on its own, making the person and their closest environment not see the need to see a specialist. This is extremely rare, since eating disorders are one of the most complicated mental disorders that can be solved without professional help, but it is a possibility. It should also be said that many cases are not counted as they are treated in private consultations with psychologists, psychiatrists, nutritionists, endocrinologists or general practitioners.

Based on all this, and despite the fact that we have global and Spanish prevalence data, it is most likely that they have a much higher percentage in the population. If the real statistics of eating disorders were known, it could be shown that they are very disorders, there was a greater awareness about them and more resources would be allocated to their detection, prevention and treatment. In any case, we are going to give a list with all the data concerning the prevalence of eating disorders.

Eating disorders are more frequent in women than in men, with a ratio of 9 out of 10 cases. Its prevalence in Spain is between 4.1 and 6.4% in women aged 12 to 21 years, and about 0.3% for men. 94% of the cases are women between the ages of 12 and 36, although there are more and more cases of men and older people. Globally, the number of TCA cases has doubled in the last two decades. The prevalence has gone from 3.4% to almost 8%.

In the adolescent population, the prevalence of eating disorders is 6%. 70% of adolescents, both boys and girls, acknowledge not feeling comfortable with their body. Many teens wish they had a more toned, muscular, and strong body for boys, or a slimmer, slimmer body for girls. 6 out of 10 adolescent girls believe that they would be happier if they were thinner and about 30% of them show pathological behaviors with food and weight.

11% of teenagers has carried out risk behaviors likely to be recognized as part of the diagnostic criteria for an eating disorder. Among these behaviors we would find following extreme diets, having an unhealthy obsession with the calories ingested, exercising to compensate for the food eaten or even purging by causing vomiting and taking diuretics and laxatives. TCA appear increasingly at younger ages, having an increase of 15% of eating disorders in children under 12 years of age in the last two decades.

The university population is also very susceptible to presenting eating disorders. Boys and girls who have just started college are taking their first steps into the adult world, discovering that they have to cook for themselves. Between the fact that they often don't have time and their culinary tastes tend towards fast food, their situation is the perfect breeding ground for developing an unhealthy relationship with food. In Spain, it is estimated that 21% of women and 15% of university men are at risk of suffering an eating disorder.

Among eating disorders, anorexia nervosa is the one with the highest mortality rate, associated above all with malnutrition but also with that the high expectations of patients with this disorder means that, dissatisfied with their body image, they end up committing suicide. The prevalence of anorexia nervosa in adolescent girls in Western countries is 1%, while bulimia is between 2 and 4%. The prevalence of unspecified ED is between 5 and 10%.

It is estimated that about 6% of obese children and adolescents between the ages of 9 and 16 meet criteria for binge eating disorder, and 14% have subclinical symptoms of binge eating disorder.