Other Programs (ticket)
Clinical Practicum: Eating Disorders: On the Road to Recovery
The objective of this year’s Clinical Practicum is to familiarize clinicians with state-of-the art diagnostic and treatment approaches to eating disorders and to demonstrate the key elements of a comprehensive Eating Disorders program during a visit to the UF Health Eating Disorder Recovery Center (EDRC).
This program opened in February of 2012 and has treated patients with eating disorders between the ages of 9 and 71 years. The UF Health EDRC program provides the traditional tenants of psychiatric treatment, including medication management, individual and group therapy, while also incorporating various other therapy modalities. Exposure Response Prevention therapy is tailored to food challenges to help patients face their fears. Patients are taught Dialectical Behavior Therapy skills to help with emotional distress tolerance and regulation for both their eating disorder fears and their comorbid depression and anxiety symptoms. Patients are encouraged to participate in yoga and art therapies, as art therapy facilitates emotional expression and insight, and yoga improves body satisfaction and decreases disordered eating attitudes and food preoccupation. As a dual diagnosis unit, the UF Health EDRC incorporates Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and other individual therapy modalities to help patients manage their comorbid psychiatric illnesses, given that comorbidity can be as high as 60-80%.
AACAP thanks the University of Florida for their partial support of the Clinical Practicum