Better? Or Faster? Intensive Day Patient Treatment for CYPEDS pre and post COVID

In this workshop we will present two models of intensive day treatment for CYP suffering from restrictive eating disorders:

Firstly, our unique, pre-COVID intensive day patient service which had success at keeping young people out of Tier 4.

Secondly, we will present our post—COVID model: social distancing restrictions meant we rapidly adapted our treatment offer to focus on family and meal support. We will report on our service evaluation data, which showed changing the model from a milieu- based model to one focusing on individualised support significantly reduced length of stay but no significant differences between models in the pattern of weight gain.

But is this a better treatment or simply a faster one? This change in treatment approach raised issues such as the patient experience; parent involvement in treatment and the contagiousness of anorexia. Using feedback from staff and care givers we will aim to reflect on the two models

Dr Tara Porter & Dr Vic Chapman

Dr Tara Porter is Lead Clinical Psychologist at Royal Free NHS Foundation Trust CAMHS Eating Disorders Service; Associate Clinical Tutor at UCL Clinical Psychology Training; and author of “You Don’t Understand Me: The Young Woman’s Guide to Life”.

Dr Vic Chapman is a Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist and Service Line Lead for Royal Free NHS Foundation Trust CAMHS Eating Disorders Service.