New Neuroendocrine Findings in Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia

An norexia nervosa is a disorder in which a patient deliberately loses weight and fails to maintain a inimal normal weight for his age and height. Bulimia nervosa is a disorder characterized by recurrent episodes of binge eating, often followed by purging of the food by vomiting. Both anorexia nervosa and bulimia are associated with pervasive endocrine dysfunction, including amenorrhea, oligomenorrhea, and thyroid disturbances. Early endocrine studies in anorectics demonstrated that the pituitary-ovarian axis showed abnormal regulation, with luteinizing hormone (LH) rhythms reverting to an immature prepubescent pattern. No studies of pituitary-ovarian function in normalweight bulimics have yet been published. The advent of new technologies and pharmacologic challenges have made it possible to examine the hypothalamo-pituitarya d renal (HPA) and hypothalamo-pituitary-thyroid (HPT) endocrine axes in greater detail. Inasmuch as these endocrine disturbances may parallel or reflect perturbations in mood, appetite, and behavior, they may have relevance to the etiologies of these illnesses.