eating disorders

Normal-Weight Teens Can Have Eating Disorders

Teenagers do not need to be rail thin to be practicing the dangerous eating behaviors associated with anorexia, a new study suggests.

Normal-Weight Teens Can Have Eating Disorders

Rather, the true measure of trouble may be significant weight loss, and the Australian researchers noted that a drastic drop in weight carries the same risk for life-threatening medical problems even if the patient is a normal weight.

Even more concerning, the scientists saw a nearly sixfold increase in this type of patient during the six-year study period.

Anorexia nervosa is a mental illness characterized by excessive weight loss and psychological symptoms that include a distorted self-image and fear of weight gain. In some patients, this can also include depression and anxiety. Those who have these symptoms but are not underweight enough to qualify for the definition of anorexia fall under a different diagnosis, known as Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (EDNOS-Wt).

“Emaciated bodies are the typical image portrayed in the media of patients with restricting eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa,” said lead researcher Melissa Whitelaw, a clinical specialist dietitian at The Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. “This paper highlights that it is not so much about the weight but the weight loss that can lead to a serious eating disorder. The complications of malnutrition can occur at any weight.”

In her study, which included 99 teens aged 12 to 19, Whitelaw found only 8 percent of the patients had EDNOS-Wt in 2005, but more than 47 percent of the patients had it in 2009.

“I was surprised to see how much it increased,” Whitelaw said. “I was also surprised at how similar they were not only physically but also psychologically. Everything about them was anorexia except that they don’t look really skinny.” Both groups had even lost a similar amount of weight: a median 28 pounds for those with anorexia and 29 pounds for those with EDNOS-Wt.

Other experts noted that it can be difficult to spot this less obvious eating disorder.

“We are conditioned to think that the key feature of anorexia nervosa is low body mass index [BMI],” said Cynthia Bulik, director of the Center of Excellence for Eating Disorders at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. BMI measures whether a person is a healthy weight for their height.

“In fact, we miss a lot of eating disorders when focusing primarily on weight,” Bulik added.

Leslie Sim, an assistant professor of psychology at Mayo Clinic Children’s Center in Rochester, Minn., said, “People are calling it atypical anorexia, but we see it every day. We see people who have all the psychological, behavioral, cognitive and physical symptoms of anorexia nervosa, but the only difference is their weight.”

Source: web md

7 ‘women’s‘ diseases men should watch out for

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Due to variations in genes, anatomy, and hormone levels, some diseases conflict women some-more mostly than men, and vice-versa. However, meditative of diseases that women are some-more disposed to as “women’s diseases” can leave group exposed to critical health problems.

Here are 7 supposed “women’s diseases” that can also strike men. If we knowledge symptoms, don’t let your gender stop we from removing treatment.

1. Osteoporosis
Osteoporosis reduces a firmness of bone, creation it some-more exposed to fractures. One in 3 women are during risk, though so are one in 5 men. Women knowledge fast bone detriment following menopause, though by 65 to 70 years old, group remove bone mass during about a same rate.

Kidney and thyroid problems, vitamin D deficiency, and lengthened bearing to steroids, cancer therapies, and anti-convulsants put we some-more during risk. You might not have symptoms, so ask your alloy for a bone firmness test.

2. Breast Cancer
Women get breast cancer some-more mostly than group since they have some-more breast tissue. Although usually about one percent of all breast cancers impact men, investigate shows that occurrence is on a rise. Men frequency mind a warning signs, so a cancer is authorised to develop. Therefore, group typically don’t tarry as prolonged as women once a diagnosis is finally made.

If you’re over 50, of African-American descent, or obese, you’re some-more during risk. Watch for any surprising lumps or skin abnormalities in a chest.

3. Thyroid Problems
The thyroid is a tiny gland that rests in a center of a reduce neck, where it produces hormones to control metabolism. If it produces too much, hyperthyroidism results. Symptoms include:

  • fatigue
  • weight gain
  • forgetfulness
  • dry, counterfeit skin and hair

If a thyroid doesn’t furnish adequate hormones, hypothyroidism results. Symptoms include:

  • irritability
  • muscle weakness
  • sleep disturbances

Women are 5 to 8 times some-more expected to have some form of thyroid illness than men, though group can still be affected.

4. Eating Disorders
As some-more group feel a vigour to be skinny and demeanour good, some-more are descending plant to eating disorders. Only 10 to 15 percent of people with anorexia or bulimia are male, though a effects can be equally devastating. Men also are reduction expected to find treatment, withdrawal them some-more during risk for complications such as:

  • heart problems
  • bone loss
  • organ failure
  • death

Athletes, portly boys, group with gender issues, and those who are concerned or have captious personalities are some-more during risk.

5. Bladder Infections
Bladder infections are most some-more common in women, though group can get them, too— quite group with an lengthened prostate, kidney stones, or an aberrant squeezing of a urethra. Treatment involves antibiotics and is typically really effective, though group need to be wakeful of a symptoms.

They include:

  • frequent urination
  • cloudy urine or bloody urine
  • a clever titillate to urinate
  • a blazing or rawness prodigy during urination
  • low-grade fever

6. Depression
Women are dual times some-more expected than group to be diagnosed with depression, though that might be since their symptoms are different. Women might feel unhappy and cry some-more often, since group are some-more expected to uncover anger, irritation, frustration, and discouragement.

Men might spin to drugs or alcohol, or rivet in unsure behavior. They are also some-more expected to finish self-murder if they try it. Because of these differences, many group go undiagnosed. Without treatment, basin is expected to worsen.

7. Lupus
About 90 percent of those diagnosed with lupus are women, though this autoimmune commotion can also strike men. Symptoms include:

  • joint flourishing and pain
  • muscle weakness
  • extreme fatigue
  • unexplained fever
  • hair loss
  • leg swelling
  • eye puffiness
  • mouth sores
  • swollen glands
  • butterfly-shaped red unreasonable opposite a overpass of a nose and cheeks

The illness is treated likewise in both genders. Your alloy might disremember it since it is singular in men. If we have symptoms, ask for testing.

Always Check with Your Doctor
Studies uncover that group are reduction expected than women to demeanour after their health. They’re 25 percent reduction expected to have visited their alloy in a past year, and roughly 40 percent some-more expected to have skipped endorsed health screenings. They’re also 1.5 times some-more expected to die from heart disease, cancer, and respiratory diseases, and they die an normal of 5 years progressing than women.

If you’re not feeling right, check with your doctor. By removing a treatments we need, we can kick a odds.

Source: Health Medcine Network

 

Anorexia linked to how cholesterol processes in our body

Scientists have linked the eating disorder anorexia to variants in a gene coding for an enzyme that regulates cholesterol metabolism.

The study suggests that anorexia could be caused in part by a disruption in the normal processing of cholesterol, which may disrupt mood and eating behavior.

For this project-the largest-ever sequencing study of anorexia – Nicholas J. Schork, a professor at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) worked with an international team of collaborators representing more than two dozen research institutions.

The project made use of genetic information from more than 1,200 anorexia patients and nearly 2,000 non-anorexic control subjects.

For an initial “discovery” study in 334 subjects, the researchers catalogued the variants of a large set of genes that had already been linked to feeding behavior or had been flagged in previous anorexia studies.

Of more than 150 candidate genes, only a handful showed statistical signs of a linkage with anorexia in this group of subjects.

One of the strongest signs came from the gene EPHX2, which codes for epoxide hydrolase 2-an enzyme known to regulate cholesterol metabolism. ”

The team followed up with several replication studies, each using a different cohort of anorexia patients and controls, as well as different genetic analysis methods. The scientists continued to find evidence that certain variants of EPHX2 occur more frequently in people with anorexia.

Schork noted that people with anorexia often have remarkably high cholesterol levels in their blood, despite being severely malnourished.

The study has been published online in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.