The importance of factors early in life for development of eating disorders in young people, with some focus on type 1 diabetes.

Aim: Eating disorders have a serious impact on quality of life, especially when combined with Type 1 diabetes. We investigated eating disorders in relation to factors early in life with some focus on Type 1 diabetes.

Methods: Out of 21,700 children born 1st of Oct 1997-1st of Oct 1999 17,055 (78.6%) were included in ABIS (All Babies in southeast Sweden) and 16,415 had adequate questionnaires. ICD-10 diagnosis from The National Patient Register was merged with the ABIS data.

Results: In total 247 individuals, 19 boys (7.7%) and 219 girls (92.3%) out of 16,415 (1.5%) developed eating disorders (EDs), 167 (1.0%) Type 1 diabetes of whom 7 (4.2%) also got eating disorders (ED) (OR 3.25 (1.47-7.28); p = 0.04), all of them years after diagnosis of Type 1 diabetes. EDs was associated with high parental education especially in fathers (OR 1.65 (1.09-2.50); p = 0.02) and to at birth anxiety, and depression among mothers. There was no association with the duration of breastfeeding.

Conclusions: Eating disorders are common in girls, with increased risk in high-educated but psychologically vulnerable families. Prevalence is increased in type 1 diabetes. Even modern diabetes treatment needs to be completed with psychological support.

Level of evidence: Level III: Evidence obtained from well-designed cohort or case-control analytic studies.