Review Article Eating Disorders in Schizophrenia: Implications for Research and Management

Copyright © 2014 Youssef Kouidrat et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Objective. Despite evidence from case series, the comorbidity of eating disorders (EDs) with schizophrenia is poorly understood. This review aimed to assess the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of EDs in schizophrenia patients and to examine whether the management of EDs can be improved.Methods. A qualitative review of the published literature was performed using the following terms: “schizophrenia ” in association with “eating disorders, ” “anorexia nervosa, ” “bulimia nervosa, ” “binge eating disorder, ” or “night eating syndrome. ” Results.According to our literature review, there is a high prevalence of comorbidity between schizophrenia and EDs. EDs may occur together with or independent of psychotic symptoms in these patients. Binge eating disorders and night eating syndromes are frequently found in patients with schizophrenia, with a prevalence of approximately 10%. Anorexia nervosa seems to affect between 1 and 4%of schizophrenia patients. Psychopathological and neurobiologicalmechanisms, including effects of antipsychotic drugs, should bemore extensively explored.Conclusions.Thecomorbidity of EDs in schizophrenia remains relatively unexplored. The clearest message of this review is the importance of screening for and assessment of comorbid EDs in schizophrenia patients.Themanagement of EDs in schizophrenia requires amultidisciplinary approach to attainmaximize