KY INBRE NOSI Supplement: Personalizing Disordered Eating Treatment Using Mobile Technology: Self-Guided, Personalized Treatment for Women

University Of Louisville, Louisville KY

Investigators

Linked publications & trials

Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Three out of four (75%) women in the United States endorse problematic disordered eating behaviors and cognitions, such as binge eating, purging, restriction, and/or body dissatisfaction. Disordered eating is associated with a huge host of poor physical and mental health outcomes, including heightened risk for cardiovascular disease, obesity, depression, anxiety, death by suicide, poor quality of life, and can develop into clinical threshold eating disorders, which carry one of the highest mortality rates of all psychiatric illnesses. Disordered eating disproportionally impacts women with prevalence rates growing in the past two years. Despite the commonality of disordered eating, there are few evidence-based treatments and prevention efforts that exist. The treatments that do exist were developed and implemented in a standardized and ‘on average’ manner. Despite the fact that there is extremely high heterogeneity in disordered eating, both in terms of how disordered eating presents and in underlying causes, there are no personalized treatments for disordered eating. Thus, it is unsurprising that treatments only work for about 50% of women. The overarching goal of the current supplement is to refine and implement a personalized, self-guided, digital intervention for women to address disordered eating and promote overall health and well-being. The proposed research uses highly innovative methods; data collected directly on the users’ smartphone is combined with state-of-the-art idiographic modeling to deliver a digital, personalized, and self-guided intervention in women’s everyday life. The specific aims of the current supplement are to (1) collect preliminary data on the feasibility, acceptability, and user uptake of a personalized self-guided mobile intervention for disordered eating in women (N=50) and (2) test the initial clinical efficacy of a personalized, self-guided disordered eating digital intervention. The proposed research has clinical impact. Ultimately, these data will lead directly to the creation and dissemination of an evidence-based personalized, self-guided treatment for disordered eating. As digital interventions overcome traditional barriers to accessing care, this research will create an easy-to-access deliverable that can reach women who would traditionally be unable to access needed treatment. Additionally, this research will provide training and educational experiences, consistent with the parent proposal, for undergraduates, graduate students, post-doctoral fellows, and will help propel the early career investigators toward additional independent funding. This proposal has high potential to decrease a common and impairing problem for women and provide additional training and resources to advance women in science.