Stern S L, Dixon K N, Sansone R A, Lake M D, Nemzer E, Jones D
Department of Psychiatry, Ohio State University, Columbus 43210-1228.
Compr Psychiatry. 1992 May-Jun;33(3):207-12. doi: 10.1016/0010-440x(92)90032-l.
We assessed the lifetime prevalence and morbid risk of psychoactive substance use disorder (SUD; alcoholism and drug use disorder) in the first- and second-degree relatives, excluding children, of 34 female patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) and 34 age- and sex-matched controls who had no history of an eating disorder. Diagnoses of relatives were made blind to probands' diagnoses. The prevalence of SUD was 9% in both anorectic and control relatives, and the figures for morbid risk were 14% and 15%, respectively; these differences were nonsignificant. These results suggest that adolescent and adult women with AN do not possess many of the familial factors that predispose to the development of psychoactive SUD.
