Originally posted by miss_swann
AIDS and Anorexia are at two totally different ends of the spectrum when it comes to research. A cure could be found for AIDS but ana is a mental disorder which happens to affect your body. You can't understand it until you've experienced it.
Schizophrenia is a mental disorder, yet non-schizos study and understand the disorder to a degree. The list goes on.
Originally posted by Bardock42
Deal.
I feel like I owe you something in return, to seal the deal. Here, take this:
Originally posted by miss_swann
AIDS and Anorexia are at two totally different ends of the spectrum when it comes to research.
no, thats a little off. Research, if done properly, will produce the same results, regardless of who is doing it. Thats the point, it doesn't matter if aids or EDs are similar.
Originally posted by miss_swann
A cure could be found for AIDS but ana is a mental disorder which happens to affect your body.
So you are trying to say that cognitive disorders cannot be cured? (let me go on to say that imho, EDs are the manifestation of other issues, like BDDs, depression, bipolar, ect. The purging is a method of control. This of course does not come from personal experience, but from talking with people and reading good research done in the field).
Because of the "coping mechanism" property of EDs, they become almost impossible to cure, simply because they become a habit for dealing with the stress that people normally go through. The idea that it cannot be cured however is ignorant at the highest level. (actually, even using the word cure with this kind of disorder is very misleading. Psychological "healing" is very different than traditional medical healing).
"mental disorder" is a terrible term. Is it cognitive? chemical? anatomical? genetic?
Originally posted by miss_swann
You can't understand it until you've experienced it.
If by "understand" you mean: "know subjectively day to day what it is like to experience the subjective emotions of a person who suffers from an eating disorder" then yes, you are correct. However, that is not necessary at all to study it, in fact, I would say that it would take much more control on the part of an experimenter who has had an ED to try and be unbiased because of their personal experience when analyzing data.
If by "understand" you mean: "know the causes, behavioural tendencies, symptoms, underlying neural activity and effective treatment" then of course we can understand it.
Anything to do with human subjective experience is still in its infancy as far as research goes, and honestly, EDs don't strike me as being nearly as difficult of a nut to crack as schitzophrenia or DID (dissasociative interpersonal disorder [multiple personalities]).
Originally posted by miss_swann
Fine then I challenge everyone that thinks Anorexia can be reasearch to find an anorexic and cure them you've got seven years... starting .... NOW!
Not all mental disorders can be cured, a reason why we have 'mental wards', to keep the loonies in place; out of harms way.
There are ex-anorexia sufferers though, people have been "cured" of the disease.
Originally posted by miss_swann
Fine then I challenge everyone that thinks Anorexia can be reasearch to find an anorexic and cure them you've got seven years... starting .... NOW!
1) anorexia cannot be "cured" in the classic sense
2) a person cannot be treated for a psychological problem without the desire to (re: the anorexic would have to come to me seeking help for anything to be remotely helpful)
3) not currently having a "treatment" does not indicate that we can never find a treatment. Not meeting an arbitrary timeline does not mean that we can never find a treatment.
4) and since you are so up to date on the research in the field (re: lol at you), I'll post this stuff for everyone else's benefit:
Which elements in the treatment of eating disorders are necessary 'ingredients' in the recovery process?-A comparison between the patient's and therapist's view.
BACKGROUND: Little is known about which therapeutic 'ingredients' in the treatment of eating disorders (anorexia nervosa (AN), bulimia nervosa (BN) and binge eating disorder(BED)) are needed for recovery. Remarkably, most studies on this topic have neglected the patient's view.
METHOD: In this study, a large sample of eating disorder patients (n = 132) was invited to evaluate which elements in the treatment they consider to be helpful and effective in their recovery process. These results were compared to the view of 49 eating disorder experts.
RESULTS: Following the patient's view, 'improving self-esteem', 'improving body experience' and 'learning problem solving skills', were considered as core elements in their treatment. No major differences were found between the different patient samples when comparing the patient's and therapist's view.
DISCUSSION: The findings suggest that therapists and patients share more or less the same view about the basic and effective elements in the treatment.
Antidepressants versus psychological treatments and their combination for bulimia nervosa
BACKGROUND: Psychotherapeutic approaches, mainly cognitive behavior therapy, and antidepressant medication are the two treatment modalities that have received most support in controlled outcome studies of bulimia nervosa.
OBJECTIVES: The primary objective was to conduct a systematic review of all RCTs comparing antidepressants with psychological approaches or comparing their combination with each single approach for the treatment of bulimia nervosa.
SEARCH STRATEGY: (1) electronic searches of MEDLINE (1966 to December 2000), EMBASE (1980-December 2000), PsycLIT (to December 2000), LILACS & SCISEARCH (to 1999) (2) the Cochrane Register of Controlled Trials and the Cochrane Depression, Anxiety and Neurosis Group Register - ongoing (3) handsearches of the references of all identified trials (4) contact with the pharmaceutical companies and the principal investigator of each included trial (5) handsearch of the International Journal of Eating Disorders - ongoing
SELECTION CRITERIA: Inclusion criteria: every randomized controlled trial in which antidepressants were compared with psychological treatments or the combination of antidepressants with psychological approaches was compared to each treatment alone, to reduce the symptoms of bulimia nervosa in patients of any age or gender. Quality criteria: reports were considered adequate if they were classified as A or B according to the Cochrane Manual.
DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Data were extracted independently by two reviewers for each included trial. The main outcome for efficacy was full remission of bulimic symptoms, defined as 100% reduction in binge or purge episodes from baseline to endpoint. Dichotomous data was evaluated by the relative risks and 95% confidence intervals around this measure, based on the random effects model; continuous data was evaluated by the average difference and the 95% confidence interval. Number needed to treat (NNT) and number needed to harm (NNH) were calculated using the inverse of the absolute risk reduction.
MAIN RESULTS: Five trials were included in comparison one (antidepressants versus psychological treatments), five in comparison two (antidepressants versus the combination) and seven in comparison three (psychological treatments versus the combination). Remission rates were 20% for single antidepressants compared to 39% for single psychotherapy (DerSimonian-Laird Relative Risk = 1.28; 95% Confidence Interval = 0.98;1.67). Dropout rates were higher for antidepressants than for psychotherapy (DerSimonian-Laird Relative Risk = 2.18; 95% Confidence Interval = 1.09;4.35). The NNH for a mean treatment duration of 17.5 weeks was 4 (95% confidence interval = 3;11). Comparison two found remission rates of 42% for the combination versus 23% for antidepressants (DerSimonian-Laird Relative Risk = 1.38; 95% Confidence Interval = 0.98;1.93). Comparison three showed a 36% pooled remission rate for psychological approaches compared to 49% for the combination (DerSimonian-Laird Relative Risk = 1.21; 95% Confidence Interval = 1.02;1.45). The NNT for a mean treatment duration of 15 weeks was 8 (95% Confidence Interval = 4;320). Dropout rates were higher for the combination compared to single psychological treatments (DerSimonian-Laird Relative Risk = 0.57; 95% Confidence Interval = 0.38;0.88). The NNH was 7 (95% Confidence Interval = 4;21).
REVIEWER'S CONCLUSIONS: Using a more conservative statistical approach, combination treatments were superior to single psychotherapy. This was the only statistically significant difference between treatments. The number of trials might be insufficient to show the statistical significance of a 19% absolute risk reduction in efficacy favouring psychotherapy or combination treatments over single antidepressants. Psychotherapy appeared to be more acceptable to subjects. When antidepressants were combined to psychological treatments, acceptability of the latter was significantly reduced.
/swish
Originally posted by miss_swannIs't it just anxiety and insecurity about weight?
AIDS and Anorexia are at two totally different ends of the spectrum when it comes to research. A cure could be found for AIDS but ana is a mental disorder which happens to affect your body. You can't understand it until you've experienced it.