The Prevalence, Incidence and Development of Eating Disorders in Finnish Adolescents-A Two-step 3-year Follow-up Study

Objective: To investigate the prevalence, incidence and development of eating disorders and subclinical eating pathology.Method: A two-step three-year follow-up study on eating disorders in adolescence (N=595) was conducted in western Finland. A screening questionnaire followed by a semi-structured interview was used to determine the prevalence, incidence and development of eating disorders.Results: The lifetime prevalence rates for females age 18 were 2.6% for anorexia nervosa (AN), 0.4 for bulimia nervosa. (BN), 7.7% for AN-NOS, 1.3% for BN-NOS and 8.5% for subclinical eating disorders. No prevalent case of DSM-IV eating disorders was found among the male participants. The incidence rate of any eating disorder in females age 15-18 was 1641 per 100 000 person-years.Conclusion: Eating disorders are relatively common in female adolescents. As many as one in five adolescent females are or have been struggling with eating disorder related issues during their teenage years. Copyright (C) 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and Eating Disorders Association.