Dr. Mary Rodts, an orthopedic nurse practitioner with over 30 years of experience, delivered a lecture Wednesday on the effects of eating disorders on the bones and body structure as a part of the "Live As You Are" health and body image conference ending today at Notre Dame.
According to a Harvard study, more than 40 percent of primary school students wanted to be thinner and most 10-year-olds had dieted, Rodts said. This weight-consciousness causes three percent of women and one percent of men to suffer from an eating disorder at some point in their lifetime.
"One of the most serious of these eating disorders is anorexia," she said.
"Those who suffer from anorexia struggle with an intense fear of gaining weight," Rodts said. "They spend 70 percent or more of their time thinking about food, dieting or calories."
Anorexia, unlike some other eating disorders, is usually identified by extreme weight-loss. Other physical symptoms include fainting, fatigue and overall weakness. Long-term sufferers might develop an irregular heart rhythm or heart failure, she said.
In contrast to anorexia, bulimia does not usually entail significant weight-loss.
"These patients eat large amounts of food over short periods and then induce vomiting or take laxatives," Rodts said. "Because the patients eat, they may maintain their weight better."
Since bulimic patients don't necessarily lose a lot of weight it is often hard for others to recognize that they may have a problem. Rodts said her niece dealt with bulimia personally and the nurse did not recognize the warning signs.
"In my niece's situation, we did not see it, we did not know it was going on," she said.
Rodts said that sometimes one of the only ways you can recognize a patient dealing with bulimia is by looking for the other symptoms.
"One initial sign is that the teeth are stained and corroded, particularly in the back, because of the repeated vomiting," she said.
The patient's hands and knuckles may also be cut "because the hands are often used as an instrument to induce purging," she said.
The third eating disorder Rodts discussed was binge eating. She said it is similar to bulimia except the patient does not purge or fast.
"[Patients] may feel deprived by dieting and they often find friendship with food," she said. "These behaviors are usually associated with weight gain and possibly obesity. These patients might eat, instead of a single donut, an entire box of Krispy Kremes."
Patients suffering from binge-eating often develop high blood pressure, cholesterol problems and type 2 diabetes, Rodts said.
Generally, she said, eating disorders can cause serious problems by interfering with the body's supply of nutrients, electrolytes and calcium.
They are especially dangerous for women because they deplete a reserve of bone strength women need later in life because they lose bone mass much more rapidly than males as they age, Rodts said.
"Acting [by getting help] is necessary to prevent lifelong disabilities," she said. "Eating disorders can affect your well-being 30 to 40 years down the road," she said.
Junior Sarah Ponto said that she found the portion of Rodts' lecture which spoke specifically to women particularly informative.
"Even though I'm a pre-med, there was a lot I didn't know about the electrolyte balance and the range of physiological effects of eating disorders," she said. "It's not just the heart, or any one system, it's everything."
Ponto said she thought the most important element was that Rodts provided statistics about the extent of eating disorders for males and females.
"A lot of people assume that eating disorders only affect females," Ponto said. "I think that we're doing a disservice to our patients if we assume that."
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