摂食障害

Eating Disorders

摂食障害は若年女性に多く発症し，拒食や過食などの食行動異常，またやせ願望や肥満恐怖，身体イメージの障害がみられる疾患である。摂食障害では特有の認知の歪みを認めることから，脳の機能異常の存在が注目されている。近年，脳機能イメージングの手法を用いて，摂食障害の病態に脳機能の観点からアプローチする研究が進められるようになってきた。摂食障害の臨床的特徴や認知的側面，脳機能画像研究について概説する。

Abstract

Eating disorders are characterized by aberrant patterns of eating behavior, including such symptoms as extreme restriction of food intake or binge eating, and severe disturbances in the perception of body shape and weight, as well as a drive for thinness and obsessive fears of becoming fat. Eating disorder is an important cause for physical and psychosocial morbidity in young women. Patients with eating disorders have a deficit in the cognitive process and functional abnormalities in the brain system. Recently, brain-imaging techniques have been used to identify specific brain areas that function abnormally in patients with eating disorders. We have discussed the clinical and cognitive aspects of eating disorders and summarized neuroimaging studies of eating disorders.