Minnesota Starvation Study

By -
This great Blog post reminded me of the potency of the Minnesota Starvation Study.

Learning of the Minnesota Starvation Study is a true a-ha moment for many in this weird, disorienting trek.

The 1945 Study was designed to determine the physiological and psychological effects of severe and prolonged dietary restriction and the effectiveness of dietary rehabilitation strategies.  Among the conclusions from the study was the confirmation that prolonged semi-starvation produces significant increases in:
  • depression
  • irritability 
  • emotional distress 
  • anxiety  
The subjects also experienced extreme reactions including:
  • self-harm
  • preoccupation with food
  • social withdrawal and isolation

hmm, sound familiar?    

Parents and Carers need to know about this study.

Having an explanation for the emotional, cognitive and behavioural symptoms allows parents and carers to understand the odd and frightening things they are seeing-  and we need to understand, we desperately need to understand.   Though we know that the physical effects are dire, it is worry about the non-physical (did we properly locked away the shapes?/ will they rage again tomorrow?/ will ever see them smile again?) that keeps us up at night.

In the Blog post referenced at the top, Emily Troscianko, also mines the MSS for what it can tell us about weight restoration (one word:  overshoot).





Comments

  1. AnonymousJune 24, 2014 at 8:06 AM

    Thank you for posting this study. This may sound really odd but it is in so many ways comforting to read. Really. When I was with my 10 yr old in the children's psych ward and wondered how my previously "healthy, normal" 10 yr old could suddenly be psychotic, riddled with OCD rituals never seen before, raging, ........ reading this study THE LIGHTBULB WENT OFF. There.It.Was. The very same eerily similar symptoms as described by these adult men who were the subjects of this study. There.It.Was. I read. I learned........we bungeed her weight back on rapidly and the majority of the worst most vile symptoms left the building so to speak. The study speaks volumes to the power of nutritional remediation rapid.full.and complete. as a first order of business for any child suffering the effects of starvation state. Thank you for posting this

    ReplyDelete
  2. Eva MusbyJuly 1, 2014 at 4:56 AM

    I found that blog post you quote (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hunger-artist/201402/recovering-anorexia-how-and-why-not-stop-halfway) fascinating. I have not heard clinicians talk of a need to overshoot but I wonder if what the author says corresponds well to parents' experience that their child only gets better after a little more weight gain.

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownJuly 1, 2014 at 10:58 AM

    I have not heard clinicians talk of overshooting either. I wonder if any do typically. We pushed weight over target and worked to keep a 'buffer' for a while which was almost impossible to do as linear growth kept flattening out the buffer. We found the 'extra' did make a difference. Wonder if others found so also.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousJuly 18, 2014 at 11:25 AM

    My Father In Law was one of the 36 men in the Minnesota Experiment, he was a consciencious objector and chose this as his alternative. My husband and I wish he were alive to ask him questions as our 13 yr old GD has AN. My husband remembers him talking about his obsessions with recipes and images of food at the time and how some of the men got really crazy in their behavior. He was a very withdrawn quiet man, he did live to 83. I think of him often with what my GD is going through.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Zoey @ Pressure Cooker PortalJune 18, 2016 at 5:11 AM

    Thanks for helping me more understand about this.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Parents and Carers: Please consider participating in this survey by Sept 7th, 2015

By -
Parent/Carer insight sought to assist in developing early identification resources. The team at the Victorian Centre of Excellence in Eating Disorders are currently developing an early intervention resource package in direct response to feedback provided by parents and carers. The aim is to have the package available for families and carers at the first point where they seek help. This resource specifically aims to assist parents or carers to determine how concerned they should be about their young person; what eating disorders are and are not; when to escalate access to treatment; where to seek treatment and what to expect; and what parents can be doing at home in the meantime. A focus group was undertaken with 15 parents and they are now wanting to expand on the very valuable learnings gleaned from the group through wider survey. So, if you could please take the time to take the survey and to forward (via the link below) on to any families you think will be willing to assist
Read more

Can FBT Strategies be used for early Eating Disorder intervention and prevention?

By -
Image
Guest Post by Lauren Muhlheim , Psy.D., CEDS and Therese Waterhous, PhD/RDN 2  Case Studies of how FBT trained clinician parents used FBT for an early intervention. Eating Disorders are serious mental illnesses with dangerous medical consequences.   Without early intervention, eating disorders may become chronic or even fatal.    Parents are often unaware of some of the early signs of an eating disorder.   Even if they are aware of early warning signs, they are often uncertain and reluctant to intervene out of fear of worsening the situation.   Maudsley Family Based Treatment (FBT) is one of the leading evidence-based treatments for adolescents with eating disorders.   Studies are underway to evaluate the effectiveness of early interventions using an FBT approach. Parents Act Now is a study at Stanford for early intervention for Anorexia and Family Internet-Based Early Bulimia Nervosa Study is underway at the University of Chicago. This paper describes how two
Read more

"Wasting Away": a Channel 4 documentary

By -
Image
"Wasting Away": A Channel 4 Documentary Mark and Maddy Austin. Photograph: David Hogan/Channel 4 To those who have watched, heard about, or who are discussing the Channel 4 Documentary “Wasting Away” , broadcast Thursday August 24, 10pm in the UK … … a blog post from F.E.A.S.T.'s Chair I watched the powerfully affecting documentary aired on Channel 4 last week, although I didn’t really want to; not because I don’t care about the story of Mark and his daughter Maddy and the effects of her illness on all of their family, and not because I don’t care about the others who were featured, many of whom have been failed or are failing within the scope of UK healthcare, but because I do care, very much.  And because I knew that I would be affected, my family having once been affected by an eating disorder too, and because of what I have seen of how eating disorders have affected many families over my many years of volunteering for F.E.A.S.T. Anyway, I watched, and a
Read more