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“Anorexia saved my life”: Coincidental anorexia nervosa and cerebral meningioma
Author(s) -
O'Brien Aileen,
Hugo Pippa,
Stapleton Simon,
Lask Bryan
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
international journal of eating disorders
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.785
H-Index - 138
eISSN - 1098-108X
pISSN - 0276-3478
DOI - 10.1002/eat.1095
Subject(s) - anorexia nervosa , occult , neuroimaging , psychology , anorexia , pediatrics , psychiatry , medicine , eating disorders , pathology , alternative medicine
Objective We report on a 13‐year‐old girl with coincidental occult intracranial tumor and early‐onset anorexia nervosa. Method The cerebral meningioma was discovered fortuitously as the result of a research project using SPECT imaging to locate a neurobiological substrate in patients with anorexia nervosa. Without SPECT, the meningioma would have remained undiagnosed until it had become symptomatic. The two conditions appear to have been completely unrelated. Results and Discussion The case highlights two important points. First, intracranial pathology should also be considered however certain is the diagnosis of early‐onset anorexia nervosa. Second, neuroimaging plays an important part in diagnosing early‐onset anorexia nervosa, both from a clinical and a research prospective. © 2001 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Int J Eat Disord 30: 346–349, 2001.