Dados do Trabalho

Título

Application of EAT-26 questionnaire for screening of Eating Disorders in Adolescents

Introdução

Adolescents engage in disordered eating behavior at an alarming rate, and many develop partial or full-blown eating disorders. The spectrum of Eating Disorders (ED) includes anorexia nervosa (AN), bulimia nervosa (BN), and binge-eating disorder. Society has promoted the message that being thin or muscular is necessary for attractiveness and sucess, this contribute to development of ED. Incidence of ED is increasing around world, mainly AN and BN, specially in female adolescents.

Objetivo

to evaluate the risk for ED in a population of adolescents attended to two schools, in Cascavel City, State of Paraná, Brazil.

Método

It was a cross-sectional, observational study carried out from February to July/2023 by application of Eating Attitudes Test-26 (EAT-26) questionnaire to students attended in two schools, a private and other public. Aged from 12 to 18 years old. For this study the cut off of EAT-26 was >21, situation this that the adolescent need a health mental professional. The variables following were analyzed: EAT-26 score, age, gender, and Body Mass Index (BMI). The data were storaged in database of Microsoft excel 2010 program.

Resultados

A total of 213 EAT-26 questionnaires was filled, of these, 12 were excluded by lack of data. Concerning to gender, 58.8% were female and 41.2% male; average age was of 15.4 years old. About EAT-26, 20.3% of adolescents presented score > 21 points, which were in risk to develop ED, of these, 78% were female and 58.5% attended in private school; concerning to weight, results were: 8.4% overweight, 3% obesity, 0.5% severe obesity, 0.5% thinness and 8% eutrophic by World Health Organization`s z-score.

Conclusão

in this research the results to ED risk was as in literature, being most common in girls and adolescents with excess weight, further enhance most prevalence in students attended at private school.
Pediatricians that attend adolescents should be aware of ED’s clinical finding because shorter length of time between symptom onset and therapy tends to improve outcome, improving quality of life to adolescents.

Referências

Sigel, EJ. Eating Disorderspp.159-170. in: Current diagnosis&Treatment. Pediatrics. 20th edition. Hay Jr. WW, Levin, MJ, Sondheimer JM, Deterding RR. 2011. New York

Palavras Chave

Eating disorder; adolescent; questionnaire