Binge Eating Disorders in Antipsychotic-Treated Patients With Schizophrenia: Prevalence, Antipsychotic Specificities, and Changes Over Time.

BACKGROUND

Excessive energy intake likely favors metabolic dysfunction in patients with schizophrenia and may be, in part, the consequence of antipsychotic treatments. However, previous studies on the prevalence of bulimia and binge eating symptoms in antipsychotic-treated patients are contradictory and not sufficiently informative.

METHODS

The prevalence of bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, and subsyndromal binge eating disorder was studied using Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, criteria in 156 patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder treated with antipsychotic monotherapy. The effects of different antipsychotics were compared.

RESULTS

The prevalence of full syndromal binge eating disorder was 4.4% and that of subsyndromal binge eating disorder was 18.7% in patients (23.1% for binge eating spectrum disorder), and there were no cases of bulimia nervosa. Compared with the whole sample, binge eating spectrum disorders were significantly more prevalent in clozapine- and olanzapine-treated patients. Comparisons of patients having undergone treatment for 2 years or less with patients treated for more than 2 years showed that binge eating spectrum disorders decrease significantly over time, the difference being significant in clozapine- and olanzapine-treated patients. Night eating, simply assessed by a single question, showed a prevalence of 30% and was more prevalent in women treated with clozapine and olanzapine, with no significant change over time.

CONCLUSIONS

Binge eating disorders should be considered as important factors involved in the development of weight gain and metabolic syndrome in antipsychotic-treated patients with schizophrenia. The difficulty to reliably assess binge eating spectrum disorders in patients with psychosis is highlighted.