RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Individuals with eating disorders (EDs) experience barriers to self-compassion, with two recently identified in this population: Meeting Standards, or concerns that self-compassion would result in showing flaws or lead to loss of achievements or relationships, and Emotional Vulnerability, or concerns that self-compassion would elicit difficult emotions such as grief or anger. This exploratory study examined the utility of self-compassion and two barriers to self-compassion in predicting clinical outcomes in intensive ED treatments. METHOD: Individuals in inpatient (n = 87) and residential (n = 68) treatment completed measures of self-compassion and fears of self-compassion, and ten clinical outcome variables at pre- and post-treatment. RESULTS: Pre-treatment self-compassion was generally not associated with outcomes, whereas pre-treatment self-compassion barriers generally were. In both treatment settings, fewer Emotional Vulnerability barriers were associated with improved interpersonal/affective functioning and quality of life, and fewer Meeting Standards barriers were associated with improved readiness and motivation. Interestingly, whereas Meeting Standards barriers were associated with less ED symptom improvement in inpatient treatment, Emotional Vulnerability barriers were associated with less ED symptom improvement in residential treatment. CONCLUSIONS: Given that few longitudinal predictors of outcome have been established, the finding that pre-treatment barriers to self-compassion predict outcomes in both inpatient and residential settings is noteworthy. Targeting self-compassion barriers early in treatment may be helpful in facilitating ED recovery.
Self-compassion is associated with a number of positive health indicators and has been shown to support recovery from an eating disorder. This exploratory study examined whether self-compassion and barriers to self-compassion predict clinical outcomes in inpatient and residential eating disorders treatment settings. Whereas self-compassion was rarely associated with outcome, self-compassion barriers were associated with the majority of variables investigated. Given that few longitudinal predictors have been established in this field, the relation between barriers to self-compassion and outcome in both inpatient and residential settings is noteworthy. Targeting self-compassion barriers early in treatment may be helpful in facilitating eating disorder recovery.
RESUMO
In eating disorders inpatient care, mandatory treatment components are central to effective service delivery. Thus, fostering a collaborative care environment that supports autonomy, competence, and connection can be challenging. This study examined whether collaborative care is associated with better outcomes in adult inpatient treatment and explored a possible determinant of collaborative care, the manner in which mandatory treatment components were delivered (e.g. consistent implementation of weight gain guidelines, provision of choices regarding intensity of treatment). Inpatients (N = 146) completed measures of eating disorder symptoms, psychological functioning and readiness and motivation for change, pre and post-treatment. At post, they also completed measures of collaborative care, treatment satisfaction, and a new measure designed to evaluate patients' experiences of mandatory treatment components. After controlling for baseline symptom levels, multiple regression analyses determined that collaborative care was associated with improvements in nearly all symptom domains. Collaborative care was also associated with patient satisfaction and the manner in which mandatory treatment components were delivered (e.g. consistency, provision of choices). In sum, a collaborative environment was associated with improvements in motivation, eating disorder symptoms, and psychiatric functioning and one way in which this may be achieved is in the manner in which mandatory treatment components are delivered.
