The impact of childhood sexual abuse and childhood traumatic events on outcome in adult inpatients with eating disorders.

backgroundChildhood traumatic events (CTE) are frequently described in patients with eating disorders. However, the understanding of how such events impact eating disorder treatment outcome is limited. The aim of this study was to examine the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) or any CTE at baseline in a naturalistic transdiagnostic sample, and to evaluate how such events affect symptom change and rates of remission at follow-up.

methodsThe sample comprised 228 adult female former eating disorder inpatients (M

resultsFindings showed high prevalence of high severity CSA and CTE at admission, respectively 33% (n = 75) and 48.7% (n = 111). Moreover, although all patients showed significant improvement in symptoms from baseline to follow-up, a significant association was found between severity of CTE exposure and remission group affiliation with 24% of those with severe CTE exposure and 40% of those with no CTE exposure being in remission.

conclusionsDespite considerable heterogeneity in demographic characteristics, treatment and length of follow-up, severity of CTE exposure was associated with remission at follow-up. Thus, patients with the highest CTE severity showed the poorest prognoses. Findings from this study underline the importance of addressing trauma experiences in assessment and therapy and indicate that CTE severity level should be considered when assessing trauma experiences.