Psychotherapy Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Psychotherapy, including details on psychiatry, psychoanalysis, methods, outcomes.

Rapid response to treatment for binge eating disorder.

Grilo CM, Masheb RM, Wilson GT

Department of Psychiatry, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06519, USA. carlos.grilo@yale.edu

The authors examined rapid response among 108 patients with binge eating disorder (BED) who were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 16-week treatments: fluoxetine, placebo, cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) plus fluoxetine, or CBT plus placebo. Rapid response, defined as 65% or greater reduction in binge eating by the 4th treatment week, was determined by receiver operating characteristic curves. Rapid response characterized 44% of participants and was unrelated to participants' demographic or baseline characteristics. Participants with rapid response were more likely to achieve binge-eating remission, had greater improvements in eating-disorder psychopathology, and had greater weight loss than participants without rapid response. Rapid response had different prognostic significance and distinct time courses for CBT versus pharmacotherapy-only treatments. Rapid response has utility for predicting outcomes and provides evidence for specificity of treatment effects with BED.

Published 6 July 2006 in J Consult Clin Psychol, 74(3): 602-13.
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