Premium
Risk of eating disorders in immigrant populations
Author(s) -
Mustelin L.,
Hedman A. M.,
Thornton L. M.,
KujaHalkola R.,
KeskiRahkonen A.,
CantorGraae E.,
Almqvist C.,
Birgegård A.,
Lichtenstein P.,
Mortensen P. B.,
Pedersen C. B.,
Bulik C. M.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
acta psychiatrica scandinavica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.849
H-Index - 146
eISSN - 1600-0447
pISSN - 0001-690X
DOI - 10.1111/acps.12750
Subject(s) - eating disorders , bulimia nervosa , anorexia nervosa , psychiatry , cohort , medicine , population , schizophrenia (object oriented programming) , cohort study , psychology , environmental health
Objective The risk of certain psychiatric disorders is elevated among immigrants. To date, no population studies on immigrant health have addressed eating disorders. We examined whether risk of eating disorders in first‐ and second‐generation immigrants differs from native‐born Danes and Swedes. Method All individuals born 1984–2002 (Danish cohort) and 1989–1999 (Swedish cohort) and residing in the respective country on their 10th birthday were included. They were followed up for the development of eating disorders based on out‐patient and in‐patient data. Results The risks of all eating disorder types were lower among first‐generation immigrants compared to the native populations: Incidence‐rate ratio (95% confidence interval) was 0.39 (0.29, 0.51) for anorexia nervosa, 0.60 (0.42, 0.83) for bulimia nervosa, and 0.62 (0.47, 0.79) for other eating disorders in Denmark and 0.27 (0.21, 0.34) for anorexia nervosa, 0.30 (0.18, 0.51) for bulimia nervosa, and 0.39 (0.32, 0.47) for other eating disorders in Sweden. Likewise, second‐generation immigrants by both parents were at lower risk, whereas those with only one foreign‐born parent were not. Conclusion The decreased risk of eating disorders among immigrants is opposite to what has been observed for other psychiatric disorders, particularly schizophrenia. Possible explanations include buffering sociocultural factors and underdetection in health care.