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Criteria Guide

Anorexia Nervosa DSM Criteria Guide

Use this page when the goal is to focus quickly on the DSM-style structure for Anorexia Nervosa.

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Criterion A

  • Restriction of energy intake leads to significantly low body weight in the context of age, sex, developmental trajectory, and physical health.

Criterion B

  • There is intense fear of gaining weight or becoming fat, or persistent behavior that interferes with weight gain.

Criterion C

  • There is disturbance in body-weight or shape experience, undue influence of body weight or shape on self-evaluation, or persistent lack of recognition of the seriousness of low body weight.

Specify subtype

  • Restricting type: during the last 3 months, weight loss has primarily been achieved through dieting, fasting, or excessive exercise, without recurrent binge-eating or purging.
  • Binge-eating or purging type: during the last 3 months, recurrent binge-eating or purging behavior has been present.

Specify severity

  • Severity is commonly framed by current body mass index in adults, while remembering that clinical severity also depends on medical instability, rate of weight loss, compensatory behaviors, and functional impairment.

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