Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T20:13:29.988Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Primary and Secondary Anorexia Nervosa Syndromes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Arthur King
Arthur King*
Affiliation:
Mont Park Hospital, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The question of the specificity of anorexia nervosa is at present unsettled. Mayer-Gross et al. (8) describe it as a syndrome with its own particular psycho-physical characteristics, and others have drawn attention to consistencies in family history, personality and symptoms in series of cases (3, 10). But no statistically controlled study has confirmed its specificity, indeed the one such study of recent years, reported by Kay (6) and Kay and Leigh (7), concluded that there is no specific anorexia nervosa, that the label covers psychogenic anorexia occurring in a wide variety of psychiatric settings. This was a retrospective survey of a series of 37 patients diagnosed as suffering from anorexia nervosa in the past. It is possible that the lack of specificity might have been due to the imprecise definition implicit in such a sampling procedure. Although the study failed to demonstrate a specific anorexia nervosa, it did not finally refute the existence of such an entity.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 109 , Issue 461 , July 1963 , pp. 470 - 479
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1963

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Bliss, E. L., and Branch, C. H. H. (1960). Anorexia Neruosa. New York.Google Scholar
2. Brill, A. A. (1939). “Report of Transactions of Section of Neurology and Psychiatry. N.Y. Acad. Med.” Arch. Neural. Psychiat., 41, 842.Google Scholar
3. Cobb, S. (1943). Borderlands of Psychiatry. Cambridge (Mass.).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
4. Déjerine, J., and Gauckler, E. (1915). The Neuroses and Their Treatment by Psychotherapy. London.Google Scholar
5. Dubois, F. S. (1949). “Compulsion neurosis with cachexia (anorexia nervosa).” Amer. J. Psychiat., 106, 107–115.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
6. Kay, D. W. K. (1953). “Anorexia nervosa: a study in prognosis.” Proc. Roy. Soc. Med., 46, 669–674.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
7. Kay, D. W. K., and Leigh, D. (1954). “Natural history, treatment and prognosis of anorexia nervosa, based on study of 38 patients.” J. Ment. Sci., 100, 411–431.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
8. Mayer Gross, W., Slater, E., and Roth, M. (1960). Clinical Psychiatry. 2nd edition. London: Cassell.Google Scholar
9. Meyer, B. C., and Weinroth, L. A. (1957). “Observations on psychological aspects of anorexia nervosa: report of a case.” Psychosom. Med., 19, 389–398.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
10. Nemiah, J. G. (1950). “Anorexia nervosa: clinical psychiatric study.” Medicine, 29, 225–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
11. Olds, J. (1959). “Higher functions of the nervous system.” Ann. Rev. Physiol., 21, 381–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
12. Siegel, S. (1956). Non-parametric Statistics. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co. Inc.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.