Anorexia nervosa: treatment satisfaction

Abstract

Patient satisfaction plays a central role in treatment alliance and outcome. Investigating patient expectations and experiences of treatment sheds light on its importance. This study examines adolescent anorexia nervosa patients and their parents' satisfaction with family-based treatment. Patients and parents answered a questionnaire at the eighteen-month follow-up focusing on expectations and experiences of treatment, therapists, aims of treatment and accomplishment. The results show that 73 per cent of the patients and 83 per cent of the parents felt that their pretreatment expectations had been fulfilled. The majority agreed that individual patient sessions and parental sessions were of great help, while the patients valued family therapy sessions as being less helpful than did parents. In overall terms, parents were more pleased with the therapists than were the patients. These data suggest that family-based treatment with individual sessions for patients, in parallel with parental sessions combined with family sessions, corresponds well to patients' and parents' treatment expectations.

Treatment perception in adolescent onset anorexia nervosa: Retrospective views of patients and parents

“…46 Our results indicate that both parents found it valuable to be involved in their child's treatment, by staying with her during hospitalization and participating in family therapy sessions. The high level of parental satisfaction with family therapy in adolescent AN is consistent with the studies of Krautter and Lock 12 and Paulson-Karlsson et al 14 In Norway, parents are entitled to sick leave with full salary to care for severely ill children under the age of 18. This helped to make their participation economically and practically possible.…”

“…Surprisingly, we have found only four studies assessing parent satisfaction in adolescent AN treatment, [12][13][14]16 and there are no comparisons of satisfaction between mothers and fathers. In the present study, both parents participated closely in the treatment and daily care of the patient, allowing us to assess and compare parents' perception of treatment.…”

“…4 To our knowledge, only five studies explicitly address client and/or parent satisfaction in children and adolescents with AN. [12][13][14][15][16] These studies investigated satisfaction during treatment, 16 at the end of treatment, 12 and retrospectively 6 months, 13 18 months, 14 and 4-22 years 15 after admission.…”

What Children Feel About Their First Encounter with Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

“…The context of child and adolescent psychiatry includes the challenge of working with both children and adults (Kazdin 2004). A follow-up study of treatment satisfaction of adolescents suffering from anorexia nervosa and their parents showed that parents were more pleased with the therapists than were their children (Paulson-Karlsson et al 2006). Indeed, it has been found that the voice of the child tends to become secondary in family therapy settings (Cederborg 1994).…”

Who’s in the Room? A Parent-Focused Family Therapy for Adolescent Anorexia Nervosa

“…Separated FBT has the potential to overcome some of the perceived challenges or deficiencies of conjoint FBT and so may be preferred by some families. In practice, separated FBT has been shown to be acceptable to families and to meet patient and parent expectations (Paulson-Karlsson, Nevonen, & Engström, 2006).…”