How effective is eating disorders treatment at RCBM?
At RCBM, we offer a multidisciplinary approach that includes medication prescribers, therapists, and dietitians, all crucial team members in treating eating disorders. Prescribers can monitor physical health, address medical complications, and provide necessary medications. Therapists offer psychological support, help patients explore underlying issues, and develop coping strategies. Dietitians provide nutritional guidance, help normalize eating patterns, and support patients in establishing a healthy relationship with food. This collaborative approach and the evidence-based interventions listed below ensure comprehensive care, address various aspects of the disorder, and increase the likelihood of successful treatment outcomes.
Anorexia Nervosa:
The treatment of Anorexia nervosa, like other eating disorders, requires a team approach. The first treatment priority is establishing a consistent eating routine to prevent long-term health complications. Individuals are provided the necessary support to establish a healthy weight for their body that ensures a regular menstrual cycle, sufficient cardiac health, adequate energy levels, and normal lab values. Many tests are completed by a physician to rule out other factors that may be contributing to weight loss and/or loss of appetite and to ensure immediate health concerns are addressed. A dietitian works with the individual to safely increase intake, address nutritional deficiencies, and ensure adequate intake. Many individuals utilize restrictive behaviors to cope with life’s challenges and to create a false sense of control. Therapists can work with individuals to make these connections and identify healthy alternative coping mechanisms. Compensatory behaviors, obsessive thoughts about food and dieting, and concerns about body image are also addressed by the care team. Meal support to provide accountability and alleviate anxiety with foods may also be incorporated into the treatment plan. Depending on the age and needs of the individual, family-based treatment may also be integrated.
Bulimia Nervosa:
Bulimia nervosa treatment is similar to anorexia nervosa, with an emphasis on providing education about the negative long-term effects of compensatory behaviors. Lessening behaviors such as intentional vomiting, laxative use, and/or compensatory exercise is a treatment priority. The treatment team will work with the individual to identify triggers for these behaviors and develop healthy alternative coping mechanisms to replace compensatory behaviors.
Binge Eating Disorder:
Addressing the underlying issues of binge eating disorder is crucial for recovery. Still, treatment does not focus on weight loss, as this can exacerbate the disorder and underlying trauma as childhood trauma factors into up to 75% of individuals with BED. A total of 60% of people with BED have been diagnosed with complex PTSD. In turn, a weight loss regimen is another form of trauma to the body.
Normalizing eating patterns is key to managing binge eating disorder and can help achieve overall health goals. Binge eating disorder is a restrictive disorder that is not solved by more restriction through weight loss methods.
Individuals feel extreme shame and confusion about binge eating. They have tried to stop many times on their own, including dieting, and their inability to control this behavior is a source of deep embarrassment. When treatment focuses on helping individuals understand that binge eating develops principally as an adaptation to complex trauma as a means of self-protection and from the deprivation created by dieting, self-compassion begins to develop.
Binge eating is a survival tool that develops when little else is available. As a result, changing the behavior is often terrifying. Breaking the cycle can feel impossible, not because individuals are weak or lack willpower, but because they are trying to change a protection they have relied on for a long time. Once an individual can understand the reasons binge eating may be protective for them, their shame about going to food to cope can decrease.
Dieting to combat binge eating disorder is futile and dangerous, setting one’s self up for a cascade of events as described above.
OSFED
We take all other eating disorders seriously. Depending on how this eating disorder's diagnosis presents itself, this will guide the treatment using interventions used in anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder.
ARFID
Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder treatment involves a thorough assessment to determine if food aversion and/or fear of choking or allergic reaction are present. Registered dietitians assess for nutritional deficiencies and adequate intake.Therapists work with individuals to improve distress tolerance with food exposures.
