ABSTRACT
Chapter 20 reviews the impact of eating disorders on older adults. These are not just diseases of youth. In fact, there is a high prevalence of dieting, body dysmorphia, and relationship between emotional distress and body perceptions in women over 50 years old. The majority of those with eating disorders in older age do not appear emaciated, potentially making them invisible to a primary care system still caught in its own weight bias. Life transitions such as divorce, empty nesting, and menopause are high risk times for exacerbation of an eating disorder. Most older patients with eating disorders have had some degree of eating pathology since adolescence. Mortality rates worsen for adults over 40 with eating disorders, but even the most medically compromised older adults can progress through medical stabilization as successfully as younger adults. Full recovery is possible.
