Active clinical trials for "Anorexia Nervosa"

Anorexia nervosa (AN) and atypical AN (AAN) are severe psychiatric illnesses associated with high disease burden including high treatment costs and excessive mortality rates. Primary characteristics of AN and AAN are food restriction, associated fear of weight gain, and a disturbance in how one's body weight or shape is experienced.The underlying neural mechanisms for the core illness behaviors of food restriction and body size overestimation in anorexia nervosa and atypical anorexia nervosa are not well understood. This project will use neurofeedback and advanced psychophysical methods to assess and moderate the neural and behavioral responses to stress and relate those results to the naturalistic environment. The results will guide the development of novel interventions.

Recent studies suggest that patients with an history of trauma may represent a specific subtype of anorexia nervosa (AM) underlined by specific neurobiological and psychopathological mechanisms. Thus, AM-T subjects would manifest cognitive (specific difficulties in executive functions), emotional (emotional disruption, impulsivity, etc.) and neurobiological (secretion of kynurenine and neurokinins in the face of stress) caracteristics different from those of AM subjects.

The hospitalization in patients with anorexia nervosa has often a short-term success, as weight is restored to a healthy level, but high percentage of patients relapse during the first year following the discharge. Starting from the observation that the relapse rate is lower in outpatient than in inpatient settings, the investigators hypothesized that the reason of this difference is the nature of inpatient treatment and post-inpatient therapy. For this reason, different procedures and strategies have been implemented during hospitalization to reduce the relapse after discharge. The aim of the study was to assess the time and the percentage of relapse after inpatient discharge and at follow-up.

Across the United States, thousands of children and adolescents suffer from eating disorders. Among young women alone, an estimated 2 to 4 percent are dealing with anorexia nervosa. Anorexia nervosa also has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder and produces a six-fold increased risk for death. Unfortunately, study shows that current treatments are only successful with 25 percent of patients and no eating disorder prevention program has been found to reduce future onset of anorexia nervosa. The goal of this study is to conduct a highly innovative pilot study that will identify risk factors that predict future onset of anorexia nervosa and investigate how the risk processes for anorexia nervosa are different from the risk processes for bulimia nervosa. The proposed pilot study will: Compare 30 healthy adolescent girls at high risk for anorexia nervosa to 30 healthy adolescent girls at high risk for bulimia nervosa, and 30 healthy adolescent girls at low risk for eating disorder in an effort to document risk processes that are present in early adolescence before anorexia nervosa typically emerges. Test whether elevations in the hypothesized risk factors predict future onset of anorexia nervosa over a four-year follow-up.

Anorexia nervosa is a severe cause of undernutrition. It leads to a dramatic decrease of weight with an important modification of the body composition. During the renutrition phase, disharmonious body composition recovery is a relapse factor. Dual X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) is the gold standard to study body composition in children with anorexia nervosa. But, due to technical limits, DXA analysis needs to take in account a potential failure to thrive with an adjustment on height. Moreover DXA needs an irradiation which does not allow close repeat measurements. Since several years, a simple, non-invasive, non-irradiant method for measure of body composition has been developed in pediatrics: the air displacement plethysmography (ADP). Actually, only one device is available for this measurement: the BodPod®. However, feasibility and accuracy of ADP compare to DXA have not been evaluated in pediatric anorexia nervosa. The aim of this study is to compare the accuracy of BodPod® compare to DXA in girls with anorexia nervosa.

Anorexia nervosa is characterized by intestinal dysbiosis, related to the feeding behavior impairment presented by these patients. Pathophysiologic hypotheses are involving the trouble of the microbiota-gut-brain axis in the field of mental diseases.

People with anorexia nervosa are known to engage in significant physical activity or sports. This practice is problematic because of the state of malnutrition, its interference with re-nutrition and the somatic and nutritional complications that the effect of physical activity can cause in these people. This significant physical activity is also called hyperactivity in the literature, it is in fact a problematic use of physical activity, it is a symptom commonly observed in people suffering from anorexia nervosa (in 31 to 80% cases). In this context, Ms. Kern lecturer in Sciences and Techniques of Physical and Sports Activities (STAPS) at the University of Paris Nanterre has developed in collaboration with the clinical team (Pre Godart) an adapted physical activity program (APA) , for patients suffering from anorexia nervosa. The APA program includes 8 sessions of 1h30 including an important part of psychoeducation. The effectiveness of this program will be evaluated in terms of both restoration of body mass index and improvement in overall health. The project's hypothesis is that adding a standardized 8-week Adapted Physical Activity program to the usual care, including psychoeducation on both problematic physical activity and the consequences in terms of good practice of physical activity leads to a better outcome of overall care in people with anorexia nervosa.

This study will examine the feasibility of off-label multilocus repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) for symptoms of Anorexia Nervosa in participants between the ages of 14-24. rTMS is a non-invasive, brain-based intervention that uses magnets to deliver energy to the brain. The investigators will also see if patients receiving multilocus rTMS show any improvements in their eating disorder, mood, anxiety, and obsessions and compulsions (if present). Participants will receive daily intervention with off-label multilocus rTMS for 20 total treatments. Participants will also be asked to complete mental health and well-being surveys, physical measurements, and 2 brain imagining scans (MRIs) at baseline, and at study end. The investigators will also ask participants to complete surveys are 1-month and 3-months after the final rTMS session. The target enrollment for this study is 45 participants.

The investigators will recruit individuals with broadly-defined AN (n = 80) who are currently in or have recently participated in higher-level eating disorder treatment (e.g., residential, partial hospitalization/day treatment, intensive outpatient treatment). Interested participants will sign consent, complete eligibility assessments, and will be randomized to receive Positive Affect Treatment for Anorexia Nervosa (PAT-AN) or Psychoeducation and Behavioral Therapy (PBT) through teletherapy shortly following discharge from higher level of care. Participants can participate in most other forms of outpatient treatment while receiving the research intervention. Participants will engage in 24 weeks of PAT-AN or PBT starting in the first 3 months post-discharge. At each session, the investigators will complete brief measures assessing treatment acceptability, affect, and eating disorder symptoms. Participants will also complete an assessment battery of self-report, EMA, and neurocognitive measures evaluating primary outcomes (BMI; eating disorder symptoms), secondary outcomes (depression, anxiety, and suicidality), and presumed treatment mechanisms at baseline, end of treatment (EOT), and 3-month follow-up (FU). All assessments will be remotely delivered via HIPAA-compliant platforms.

This study will examine the impact of high-frequency repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation on food choice behavior and related neural activity.