Study Links Eating Disorders to Childhood Infections
Results of the population-based study, published in JAMA Psychiatry, found that infections that required hospitalization or treatment with anti-infective medications, such as antibiotics, antifungals or antivirals, increased the risk of developing an eating disorder by as much as 39%. The multi-institutional study, which analyzed the health histories of more than 500,000 adolescent girls in Denmark, also found that recurrent infections and repeated treatment increased the risk.