Eating disorders concern around 5% of the general population (APA, 2000) and are explained by a constellation of risk factors including genetic, biological, psychological and social factors (Guy-Rubin & Gorwood, 2016). Anorexia nervosa, for example, has the highest mortality rate of psychiatric disorders (Arcelus et al., 2011), either by suicide or somatic complications, with an average of 1% of death every year. The aim of any care provided to patients with anorexia nervosa relies on normal BMI, and especially for hospitalization, as its length is usually fixing a healthy weight compatible with discharge (Lund et al., 2009). Nevertheless, one patient out of two relapses in the year following hospitalization (Eckert et al., 1995; Steinhausen et al., 2008) and suicidal mortality increases with the length of follow up (Steinhausen et al., 2002). There is therefore an unmet need to use more accurate cues for treatment aims, more specifically targeting causes (the involved abnormal mechanisms) than consequences (abnormal weight), potentially providing more reliable criteria for remission and recovery.
Consensus for remission and recovery in eating disorders are also important to detect between differencies of outcome between countries, disorders and clinicans.
Anotehr aspect which is lacking, while defining what is remission in eating disorders, concerns quality of life, level of functioning, and wellbeingness. These concepts might be more complex and heterogeneous, but they capture important aspects of improvement, as "patient centered" rather than "disorder centered".
We will expose the already proposed definitions of remisison and recovery (Khalsa et al. Journal of Eating Disorders (2017) 5:20) and will discuss the pros and cons of homogeneous criteria for eating disorders