Anorexia in Men Underdiagnosed

Due to the perception that anorexia nervosa is a disease that only affects women, many doctors underdiagnose cases in the male population, reports a new study conducted by the University of Oxford and the University of Glasgow. Published Tuesday in the journal BMJ Open, the study was based on interviews with 39 people with anorexia ages 16 to 25. 25 percent were men, and a commonality was that doctors were much slower to recognize their symptoms and diagnose them. "Our findings suggest that men may experience particular problems in recognizing that they may have an eating disorder as a result of the continuing cultural construction of eating disorders as uniquely or predominantly a female problem," said the report. One man with anorexia who was included in the study was even told to “man up” to deal with his symptoms.