At Mirasol we have been admitting many more patients recently who are considered to be dual-diagnosis patients, meaning that they have more than one serious diagnosis. It is not uncommon for a patients to admit with not only an eating disorder, but substance abuse, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and accompanying anxiety.
The conventional way of thinking is to treat the substance abuse first, then address the eating disorder. At Mirasol, we have long believed that co-occurring conditions need to be treated simultaneously. If all the conditions are not treated at the same time, treatment outcomes are usually poor, and what would ordinarily be considered a small slip can turn into a cascading event, almost like a house of cards, with one slip triggering another one rapidly.
A strong connection between eating disorders and substance abuse has been long evident with a majority of women reporting binge eating and/or bulimia nervosa along with the substance abuse. Some 40-50% of all women who have an eating disorder will have a problem with alcohol and drugs either currently or at some time in their lives. The eating disorder and substance abuse are frequently accompanied with PTSD.
