Dying to Be Thin: Anorexia

Anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder. People with anorexia feel overweight, even when they are actually thin.

Speaking from my point of view, I myself and most guys out there I reckon, don’t really dig girls who are skinny thin, please ladies, don’t abuse your body to the extreme to look frail.

Anorexia nervosa is a psychiatric illness that describes an eating disorder characterized by extremely low body weight and body image distortion with an obsessive fear of gaining weight. Individuals with anorexia nervosa are known to control body weight commonly through the means of voluntary starvation, excessive exercise, or other weight control measures such as diet pills or diuretic drugs.

While the condition primarily affects adolescent females, approximately 10% of people with the diagnosis are male. Anorexia nervosa, involving neurobiological, psychological, and sociological components, is a complex condition that can lead to death in the most severe cases.

Anorexia is thought to have the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder, with anywhere from 6-20% of those who are diagnosed with the disorder eventually dying due to related causes. The suicide rate of people with anorexia is also higher than that of the general population and is thought to be the major cause of death for those with the condition.

The first line treatment for anorexia is usually focused on immediate weight gain, especially with those who have particularly serious conditions that require hospitalization. In particularly serious cases, this may be done as an involuntary hospital treatment under mental health law, where such legislation exists.

In the majority of cases, however, people with anorexia are treated as outpatients, with input from physicians, psychiatrists, clinical psychologists and other mental health professionals.