Sign up for the first CAPSS webinar
On 5 July, the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Surveillance System (CAPSS) will host its first webinar: a presentation by Dr Dasha Nicholls on the subject of COVID and Eating Disorders in childhood and adolescence.
Services for children and young people (CYP) with eating disorders (ED) have undergone a transformation in recent years, accompanying the Five-Year Forward View for Mental Health.
As a result, detailed data are reported quarterly through the NHS Digital Strategic Data Collection System (SDCS) for the 70 or so CYP ED services across England.
These data show that referrals for ED among CYP almost doubled between 2016 up to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Spring of 2020.
Twelve months into the pandemic the number of urgent referrals had doubled and routine referrals increased by 50%.
Services that had responded to demand at first began to buckle under the strain, and waiting times, which had been nearing the government target, with some regional variation, started to rise. Increased presentations to emergency departments and acute admissions to paediatric wards accompanied this rise.
This webinar will discuss theories on why COVID-19 has affected those vulnerable to ED specifically, with a focus on atypical anorexia nervosa and avoidant restrictive food intake disorder, summarising the key principles of management in acute settings and in community services.
The webinar will outline why joined-up clinical and public health approaches to ED and obesity are needed, focusing on body image, emotional eating, health behaviours and tackling weight stigma. The webinar will also examine new models of care for CYP with ED, which provide intensive community support to ensure hospitalisations are as brief as possible and that CYP and their families are supported in their own homes, schools and communities.
This webinar is a paid for event, open to all. You can find out more information on the CAPSS page.
(Non-members of the College will be required to create an account in order to register for this event.)
Back to our June 2021 eNewsletter.