Long-term mortality in anorexia nervosa: a report after an 8-year follow-up and a review of the most recent literature.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate long-term mortality rate of anorexia nervosa (AN) patients in a southern Italy population compared to the most recent literature.


METHODS
Retrospective and review setting.


METHODS
One hundred and forty-seven female AN patients, consecutively admitted from 1994 to 1997 to the Outpatient Unit, were re-examined between June and November 2003. Our data are compared with 10 other studies published since 1988.


RESULTS
One hundred and twenty-three deaths in 2240 patients, amounting to a total mortality rate of 5.25% were reported in the literature. Deaths due to suicide, AN-related and AN-unrelated diseases were 1.20, 3.07 and 0.98%, respectively. After correcting for unrelated deaths, mortality rate was 4.27%. In our 8-year follow-up, we found a mortality rate of 2.72% (1.82% after correcting for unrelated deaths). Standardized mortality ratio was 9.7.


CONCLUSIONS
We interpret our favourable findings as a consequence of an integrated, clinical-nutritional and psychiatric approach. Finally, considering AN demographic characteristics, that is young female subjects in Westernized societies, mortality rate is confirmed to be dramatically high.
Signorini
A
A
1Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, Interuniversity Centre for Obesity and Eating Disorders, University Federico II, Naples, Italy.
De Filippo
E
E
Panico
S
S
De Caprio
C
C
Pasanisi
F
F
Contaldo
F
F
D000328:Adult; D000856:Anorexia Nervosa / Q000401:mortality*; D002423:Cause of Death; D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy / Q000453:epidemiology; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D015996:Survival Rate