Key statistics on bulimia nervosa are: The lifetime prevalence of bulimia nervosa for adult women ranges from 1.7%-2.0% and for men ranges from 0.5-0.7% 1.
Surveys show a rate of approximately 1.5 percent of the US female population and 0.5 percent of the male population has experienced bulimia in their lifetimes. These percentages translate to 4.7 million females and 1.5 million males.
Of people with an eating disorder, 3% have anorexia nervosa, 12% bulimia nervosa, 47% binge eating disorder (BED) and 38% other eating disorders.
Eating disorders affect at least 9% of the population worldwide. 9% of the U.S. population, or 28.8 million Americans, will have an eating disorder in their lifetime. Less than 6% of people with eating disorders are medically diagnosed as “underweight.”
Bulimia affects more women than men. It affects up to 2% of women1 and happens to women of all races and ethnicities. Bulimia affects more girls and younger women than older women. Teen girls between 15 and 19 and young women in their early 20s are most at risk.
Broken down by gender, bulimia develops in 1.5% of women and 0.5% of men, making it five times more common to develop in women.
Bulimia Prognosis
Though the road to recovery can be challenging, the 5-year clinical recovery rate has been reported at 55.0%.
In the United States, binge eating disorder is the most prevalent, with 3% of American adults having a binge eating disorder at some point in life. US women will get binge eating disorders at some point. This makes the disorder more than three times as prevalent as bulimia and anorexia.
Eva Schoen, PhD, assistant professor of psychiatry and clinical director of eating disorders services at University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics, says binge eating disorder, or BED, is the most common eating disorder, even though it's not talked about as much as other eating disorders, such as anorexia or bulimia.
It is fair to say that the increasing rate of eating disorders, Japan has the highest rate of prevalence, followed by Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, and South Korea.
People with bulimia nervosa usually have a normal weight. They engage in a cycle of binging and purging. People with anorexia nervosa are usually underweight. They engage in self-starvation, extreme diets and extreme exercise to lose weight.
More people have bulimia than anorexia. The DSM-5 states that between 1 and 1.5 percent of young females have bulimia. Like with anorexia, little information exists about the condition's prevalence in men, but women with the condition outnumber men with the condition by 10 to 1.
It is estimated that up to 4% of females in the United States will have bulimia during their lifetime.
Bulimia may cause numerous serious and even life-threatening complications. Possible complications include: Negative self-esteem and problems with relationships and social functioning. Dehydration, which can lead to major medical problems, such as kidney failure.
Close to 70% of people with bulimia are recovered within nine years. [2] For many, early wins in recovery help spur them to keep working. Often, those early wins involve physical complications. You're less likely to return to harmful methods when you notice your body changing and healing.
While any mental health disorder can pose significant health challenges, eating disorders are currently the most deadly category of mental health conditions. Any mental health disorder can present risk factors across the duration of a person's life.
Anorexia has the highest mortality of any psychiatric diagnosis other than opioid use disorder and can be a very serious condition. Body mass index or BMI, a measure of weight for height, is typically under 18.5 in an adult individual with anorexia nervosa.
Anorexia nervosa is the least common of the three eating disorders, but it is often the most serious.
Bulimia involves binge sessions in which large amounts of food are consumed. During these uncontrollable episodes of food consumption, people often eat very quickly to the point where they are very uncomfortable. People with bulimia can eat between 5,000 and 15,000 calories in one sitting.
A binge eating episode can last over an hour, though it may be much shorter or longer. Sometimes binge eating is a planned activity and other times it is not. Most binges involve the consumption of more than 1,000 calories, with a quarter of binges exceeding 2,000 calories.
Former model Karin Bauman died Tuesday at the age of 35, after fighting against the anorexia nervosa eating disorder for over a decade. Bauman was admitted to the intensive care unit at Tel Aviv's Ichilov Hospital at the beginning of the week after her condition deteriorated due to a pneumonia infection.
If you have bulimia, your day may be filled with anxiety about eating and finding ways to hide it from others. Most of your day may be filled with trying not to think about food or attempting to control your urge to overeat, or binge eat. In some cases, binge eating is not about hunger.
Long Term Effects of Bulimia
People with severe BN (8-13 binge/purge episodes per week), and extreme BN (14 or more binge/purge episodes per week) may experience both short- and long-term complications related to the eating disorder, depending on the type and frequency of purging.
So yes, Bulimia Nervosa is heritable, and the studies above have identified many genetic variants associated with this complex disorder and provided valuable insight into our genetic architecture.