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Volume 3 Supplement 1

Proceedings of the 2015 Australia and New Zealand Academy for Eating Disorders (ANZAED) Conference: Riding the Waves to Recovery

Significant nutritional variables in patients with eating disorders

Journal of Eating Disorders volume 3, Article number: O62 (2015) Cite this article

Retrospective chart analysis of 113 patients presenting to a general practitioner with eating disorders was conducted, in an attempt to identify statistically and clinically significant nutritional variables. Blood tests are a useful diagnostic tool in eating disorders, and this research suggests that current testing should be broadened to include trace minerals such as zinc and manganese.

Results were analysed for cholesterol, red blood cell folate, vitamin B12, magnesium, manganese, zinc, vitamin D, phosphate, ferritin, white cell count, red cell count and platelets. Patients were analysed as an entire group, but also separately as those suffering from Anorexia Nervosa (1), Bulimia Nervosa (2), EDNOS (3) and classic AN followed by BN (4).

Analysis using T tests and chi squared showed that variables most likely to lie outside the population reference range were manganese, cholesterol, ferritin, vitamin B12, zinc and vitamin D.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Brisbane City Doctors, Brisbane, Australia

    Leanne Barron

  2. QUT ED CLINIC, Brisbane, Australia

    Leanne Barron

  3. Charles Sturt University, New South Wales, Australia

    Robert Barron

  4. University of Queensland Medical School, Brisbane, Australia

    Jeremy Johnson

  5. University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia

    Shannon Ward

  6. QUT Eating Disorder Clinic, Brisbane, Australia

    Ingrid Wagner

  7. Queensland Eating Disorders Outreach Service, Brisbane, Australia

    Warren Ward

Authors
  1. Leanne Barron
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  2. Robert Barron
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  3. Jeremy Johnson
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  4. Shannon Ward
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  5. Ingrid Wagner
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  6. Warren Ward
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Leanne Barron.

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This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

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Cite this article

Barron, L., Barron, R., Johnson, J. et al. Significant nutritional variables in patients with eating disorders. J Eat Disord 3 (Suppl 1), O62 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/2050-2974-3-S1-O62

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/2050-2974-3-S1-O62

Keywords

  • Cholesterol
  • Zinc
  • Manganese
  • Folate
  • Ferritin

Journal of Eating Disorders

ISSN: 2050-2974