Dr Helen Bould is a Consultant Senior Lecturer in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the University of Bristol and Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust. Her research interests are in the epidemiology of and cognitive processes underlying eating disorders and self-harm. She is also more widely interested in how we understand and treat mental illness in children and adolescents. She completed her MA in Medical and Veterinary Sciences at University of Cambridge, her BMBCh at the University of Oxford, her psychiatry training in Severn Deanery and her DPhil at the University of Oxford. She is a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
Helen Bould summarises a guide for clinicians on how to deliver enhanced cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT-E) for people with eating disorders during COVID-19.
Helen Bould appraises a new Swedish study published today in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, which evaluates the strength of associations for the bidirectional relationships between eating disorders and autoimmune diseases.
Helen Bould considers the findings of the MOSAIC RCT that compares the Maudsley Model of Anorexia Nervosa Treatment for Adults (MANTRA) with Specialist Supportive Clinical Management (SSCM) in outpatients with broadly defined Anorexia Nervosa.
Helen Bould appraises a recent meta-analysis of second-generation antipsychotics for anorexia nervosa, which finds that the drugs don’t lead to weight gain or improve eating disorder symptoms. So why are antipsychotics being used in this group of patients?
Helen Bould summarises a new systematic review that finds a lack of evidence for the digital treatment or prevention of eating disorders. With so many new websites and apps popping up every week, why is there no reliable evidence of positive effect?
Helen Bould summarises a meta-analysis of interventions for caregivers of someone with an eating disorder, which highlights a lack of high quality primary research.
Helen Bould summarises a recent review that maps the evidence for the prevention and treatment of eating disorders in young people. Her conclusion? A call to arms for more better quality research to help people affected by these serious illnesses.
In 2012 there was a call from Parliament to research school interventions to reduce body dissatisfaction. Helen Bould reports on an RCT of school-based prevention programme for eating disorders, which highlights the need for more work in this area.
Helen Bould tells us that mindfulness may do many things, and is queuing up to take its place with CBT as the panacea of mental illness, but in her view it cannot yet lay claim to solving binge eating.
