Anorexia nervosa is a frequent eating disorder especially in teenagers and young girls occurring more due to an emotional and psychological problem than due to food-related issues. If not early and properly cared for, it can release dangerous physical and mental complications much harder to control and cure than the original problem.



The most common encountered physical consequences of anorexia are hair loss, low resistance to diseases, low need for sleep, hypersensitivity to heat, general weakness and severe dehydration that might even lead to kidney failure. In late stages without any professional help, the anorexic patients will get to suffer from heart problems, low heart rates, low blood pressure, anemia, low body temperature, poor circulation and even death.

The most important behavioral and emotional effects of anorexia nervosa are depression, irritability and bad memory and memory losses. Additional nervous and mental problems that might occur are isolation from family and society, concentration difficulties on other subjects different from body weight, regression to an early childish emotional estate and feelings of guilt. Many of the obsessed patients appeal to alcohol and drug abuse trying to handle their negative self-impressions.

Nervous anorexia seems to be caused by a group of complicated factors in which sociocultural items seem to have the most important role today when thinness is most appreciated by the society. Persons starving for the appreciation and approval of the society get to even starve themselves in order to be accepted by the people around them. As thinness in young women seems nowadays to be the key towards success in both personal and professional lives of young persons, patients try to meet the ideal.

But the sociocultural factors causing anorexia are only one of the more complicated items linking to the development of anorexic symptoms in young persons. The inner feelings especially about themselves, personality and personal history are also important factors leading to the apparition of the condition. Some abnormal behavioral factors seem to be in direct contact to anorexia susceptibility: obsessions, low self-esteem, willing for perfection, approval seeking, irritability, withdrawal and limited thinking.

Critical transitions and strong emotional events, early life traumas, physical or sexual abuse can all trigger anorexia by affecting the brain and having a major impact on both biology and physiology of the patient. Eating disorders are also caused by interpersonal relationships, related conditions like anxiety or depression, overwhelming dual feelings of the adolescents and will of total control.

According to studies, the predisposition to anorexia inside a family seems to be related also to genetic factors. Blood analyses of patients suffering from anorexia nervosa have revealed impressively high levels of Serotonin, a brain neurotransmitter, which decrease the person's need for food or desire for being among other people. Scientists see this more like a complication of anorexia and not as a factor causing it.