Health food disease： when health awareness goes too far.

Original Sara Novak Neuroreality is included in the topic # Depth | Deep-diving 320 # Cognitive Science 100.

The concept of "clean diet" has a broad definition in the field of health. From strict vegetarianism or fish element * to ketogenic diet or gluten-free diet-we often define ourselves by the kinds of food we eat. Sometimes, whether we give up dairy products or only eat organic food, our strict dietary preferences may turn into some degree of compulsive behavior. As for people suffering from orthorexia, it may become dangerous to be unable to eat any food that they think is unhealthy.

* Translator’s note

It means that all meat is forbidden except fish.

Health food disorder is an eating disorder characterized by refusing to eat anything that is considered "impure" or "unclean". Terri Griffith [2], a clinical coordinator of Shepard Pratt’s Eating Disorder Center, said: "People with healthy food disorders are particularly concerned that they can only have healthy food in their bodies, and they have an unhealthy compulsion for the quality of food." She added that this is a relatively new obstacle, but gradually there has been more and more discussion about it.

– Jeannie Phan –

This concern may also escalate into neurosis. For example, when a person with healthy food syndrome attends a party and there is no food that meets their specific clean eating standards, they may not eat at all. According to Griffith, a clean diet is ok, and this strict standard is the problem. It may start with someone choosing to eat only a certain kind of food, such as a strict vegetarian diet or a low-carbon water diet, but it often develops to exclude the whole food group until the diet becomes too strict.

For people who are more prone to eating disorders, this food exclusion may be an inducement-and the epidemic has made the situation worse. Lauren Smolar, senior director of the American Eating Disorder Association [3] program, explained that patients who are already in the recovery stage may relapse due to various epidemic-related stress factors. In addition, people who could have received treatment may find it difficult to get the help they need because of the blockade, which may make their situation worse and it will be more difficult to recover in the future.

Discussion on diagnosis

Smolar said: "In the end, healthy food disease can lead to serious consequences, including malnutrition and other serious health problems."

For example, this calorie restriction may lead to cardiovascular problems-when the body can’t get enough calories, it begins to break down its own tissues and muscles. And because the heart is a muscle, malnutrition may lead to a weak and slow pulse. Calorie restriction may also lead to gastrointestinal problems and amenorrhea.

Griffith said that patients with healthy food disorders who visit eating disorder centers are usually diagnosed as anorexia)[4] nervosa [4], simply because healthy food disorders are not defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders [5] (DSM, which is well known to mental health experts). Although these patients will strictly limit calories, they do not simply limit calorie intake, but adopt critical standards to choose foods that they think are healthy.

– Yuko Furusho –

According to Griffith, it is important to introduce patients to foods outside their comfort zone. She said: "We want to reduce the stigma of’ certain types of food are harmful to them’. We expose them to more diverse foods so that they can become more adaptable to them. "

Smolar added that it is not clear when the health food disease can get its own diagnosis. She said: "There is still disagreement in the literature about whether healthy food disorder is a special eating disorder or related to obsessive-compulsive disorder, so doctors and health experts are still discussing how to advance the next step. “

The nature of this disease makes the diagnosis more difficult to define. Patients not only care about calorie restriction [6], but also want to ensure that their diet consists of certain foods, which is considered by some mental health experts as a feature of obsessive-compulsive disorder. This also makes it difficult for experts to measure the prevalence of health food disease-in different estimates [7], this ratio is as low as less than 7% of the Italian population and as high as nearly 90% of Brazilian students. But Smolar said that this should not affect the way it is treated, and it still needs the professional help of psychologists.

Although health food disease is not a diagnosis, it is clear that the discussion around this obstacle is advancing. It is a cultural trend to pay special attention to what is in the food we eat, but sometimes it may go too far-after all, the pursuit of health will go too far.

references

[1] https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/what-science-says-about-athletes-going-vegan

[2] https://www.sheppardpratt.org/why-sheppard-pratt/our-experts/details/terri-griffith-psyd/

[3] https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org

[4] https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/a-large-genetic-study-of-anorexia-may-begin-yielding-clues-to-treatment

[5] https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/practice/dsm

[6] https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/calorie-restricted-diets-may-not-live-up-to-the-hype

[7] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8160773/

Author: Sara Novak | Translator: Meat | Proofreading: Old orange

Editor: Pheasant | Typesetting: Yo Yo Yo | Cover: Daniele Simonelli

Original text:

https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/orthorexia-when-health-consciousness-goes-too-far

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