Press Release No. 20/2022 - Day of the Lilac Ribbon on eating disorders, updated the map of health services, to date there are over one hundred accredited centers

ISS, March 15, 2022 - It is constantly evolving the map of ISS dedicated to services on eating disorders, to date there are 108 accredited facilities (they were 91 a few weeks ago) throughout the country (101 of the NHS and 7 of private accredited): 55 centers in the North (including 19 in Emilia Romagna), 18 in Central Italy and 35 in the South and Islands.

These are the latest data collected by Iss and presented today, March 15, on the occasion of the National Day of the Lilac Ribbon, during a round table at the Museum dedicated both to epidemiological aspects and to the stories of discomfort told in the book "Hungry for Love" by Fiorenza Sarzanini.

"Facilitating the request for help and informing about the assistance are the objectives of the mapping of the centers - explains Roberta Pacifici, head of the National Center for Addiction and Doping of the ISS - after having surveyed the structures of the NHS, in fact, the Institute has also begun to map the centers of the private accredited, noting a strong impact and involvement on these eating disorders, unfortunately increasing during the pandemic period".

The continually evolving census also provides information about the people being treated.  Nearly 9,000 users (8,947) are in charge of 65% of the Centers surveyed, mostly 90% female compared to 10% male. Fifty-eight percent of users are between 13 and 25 years of age, and 7% are under 12 years of age.  With respect to the most frequent diagnoses, anorexia nervosa is represented in 36.2% of cases, bulimia nervosa in 17.9% and binge eating disorder in 12.4%. There are also 1,099 professionals working in the centers, all trained and updated: mainly psychologists (21%), psychiatrists or child neuropsychiatrists (17%), nurses (14%) and dieticians (11%).

Today's event is also an opportunity to take stock of epidemiological updates after two years of health emergency due to Covid.

"During the pandemic - says Laura Dalla Ragione Head of the Eating Disorders Network Usl 1 of Umbria - people who suffered from an eating disorder have worsened. Maybe they took months to find the courage to ask for help or they waited months for a hospitalization, increasing the risk of chronic or relapse in the disorder".

The most recent data, in fact, related to a survey concluded in February 2021, based on the intersection of different information flows analyzed by the CINECA Interuniversity Consortium, confirm an increase in the pathology of almost 40% compared to 2019: in the first half of 2020, 230,458 new cases were detected in the different information flows compared to 163,547 in the first half of 2019.  The overall care burden of new cases and cases in treatment was detected in 2020 in the number of 2,398,749 patients, an underestimated figure since there is a large share of patients in this pathology who do not reach treatment.

The survey data also reveal a further lowering of the age of onset: 30% of the diseased population is under 14 years and a greater prevalence in the male population (in the range between 12 and 17 years includes 10%).

These are increasingly younger people who find it hard to let their discomfort surface. An aspect addressed in the book "Hungry for love” by Fiorenza Sarzanini, presented today during the round table by the deputy director of Corriere della Sera, who in her book of stories of eating disorders, also includes her own to show that this disease can be overcome and to say that it can and should be talked about because "an alliance between those who make information and those who design health strategies is necessary. We need to talk about these issues, they must become an instance of health - says Sarzanini - this is the first step to create a health and social network, for children and their families, that does not leave anyone alone and that can accommodate a path of rebirth”.

All the centers surveyed are available 'in real time' at this link

 https://piattaformadisturbialimentari.iss.it/