Orthorexia nervosa prevalence study in health-care and non-health care individuals

A term that primarily mentioned by Steve Bratman in 1997 has recently become more prevalent but hasn't included in latest DSM-V criteria yet. This study is conducted to determine the prevalence of orthorexic behavior in health care workers and non-health care individuals. 206 participants were selected to attend in the study who works in Ankara Training and Research Hospital as doctor, nurse or midwife (68 men, 138 women). The non-health care individuals were selected from relatives of the health care workers (89 men, 117 women). Socio-demographic characteristics of individuals and lifestyle habits were determined with a questionnaire form. Ortho-11 scale was implemented for Orthorexic behavior assessment, the EAT-40 scale was used to assess eating attitudes. The mean age of Health care workers is 34.2 ± 8.69, the mean age of non-health care individuals is 36.4 ± is 9.05.The mean BMI of health care workers 24.2±0.27 kg/m² and the mean BMI of non-health care individuals 24.7±0.32kg/m². The 77.2% of health care worker have the thought of being healthy and the 57.8% of them don't have a chronic disease. The 81.6% of the non-health care individuals have a thought of being healthy and 67.7% of them don't have a chronic disease. The mean score for Ortho-11 scale is 26.6±0.21 for health care workers and 26.3±0.25 for non-health care individuals. The mean score for EAT-40 scale is 11.7±8.37 for health care workers and 12.0±8.03 for non-health care individuals. There was no significant statistical difference between health care workers and non-health care individuals, (p>0.05). In non-health care individuals who have thought of being healthy and don't have chronic disease has high eating attitudes score (p<0.05). Although, the classification of ON is going to be continued the results we have achieved in our study and the other studies, prevalence is increasing(%60.1 vs %61.2). Construction of a more comprehensive and more specific studies on the subject, will provide an important contribution determining the ON criteria and creation of diagnosis and treatment protocols.