Eating Disorder PTSD Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Eating Disorder PTSD - Essay Example The greatest differences were found between sexual traumatizations and non-sexual traumatizations and individuals who had experienced both child sexual abuse and rape in adulthood were found to most likely display an ED-related psychopathology. Women who had been sexually assaulted were significantly more likely to report an ED compared to women who had not been assaulted. Sexual abuse hence, is an important predictor of bulimia nervosa and other bulimic disorders and based upon an 18-year prospective and longitudinal study, this implies that traumatizations, especially sexual traumatizations may augment the risk of ED development. Through recent studies, psychotherapists had been able to diagnose PTSD in only one case of the anorexic and in three cases of the bulimics patients, indicating as well that PTSD is less pronounced in routine clinical practice and further inquiry on the possibility of traumatic events to have occurred in ED patients is suggested. Since many patients are no t comfortable revealing major traumatizations during the initial stages of therapy, evaluation of trauma during therapy is encouraged to progress with sufficient time. While ED patients have scarcely been found to experience somatization, ED patients with PTSD exhibited more somatization symptoms than patients without PTSD.