Your treatment may include individual, family, or group therapy.
Your treatment doesn’t stop after you regain healthier eating habits.
You’ll continue to receive medical monitoring and mental healthcare to support your progress.
Verywell / Michela Buttignol
Eating disorder treatment should be individualized.
However, you’re free to optimize their effectiveness by using them in combination with psychotherapy.
These treatments can aid inweight gainand improvingbone densitybut are not the sole treatment for an eating disorder.
Verywell / Michela Buttignol
Therapies
Psychotherapy is the foundation of eating disorder treatment.
In most cases, a combination of therapies will be the most effective treatment.
In CBT, a person is taught to identify and change negative and distorted thought patterns.
Changing their thoughts leads to positive changes in emotions and behaviors.
Then, you learn coping mechanisms to deal with these negative thought cycles.
Eventually, your therapist works with you to change yourdisordered eatingbehaviors.
It is now a leading eating disorder treatment method for children and adolescents with eating disorders.
Throughout FBT, control is gradually transitioned back to the child.
FBT is typically offered in outpatient or occasionally partial hospitalization configs.
A systematic review found that FBT is not more effective than individual therapy at the end of treatment.
However, FBT does have longer-term results with significant benefits maintained six to 12 months after treatment.
Some research indicates that family-based therapy may actually be more effective than CBT at treating bulimia nervosa among adolescents.
Returning to a healthy body weight and following a balanced meal plan is essential for healing.
However, this may be physically and emotionally painful for the person in recovery.
Occupational therapists approach health and rehabilitation through the lens of a person’s meaningful activities and routines.
Physical Therapy
Physical therapy(PT) has an emerging role in eating disorder treatment.
It’s crucial to seek medical treatment due to the life-threatening impact and long-term health complications of eating disorders.
Yoga is now often incorporated into mainstream treatment in residential or outpatient controls.
However, more research is needed on the benefits of yoga for various eating disorders.
For many, recovery is not synonymous with complete remediation of all eating disorder challenges.
Instead, improving insight and self-management may be more meaningful than a complete lack of psychological or medical issues.
Like many mental health conditions, eating disorders can be chronic.
The team includes medical care, nutritional counseling, and therapy.
Medical specialists prescribe medications, treat complications, and support your overall health.
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