60% increase in people seeking help has forced treatment strategy rethink

Clinical Manager of the Eating Disorder Centre Cork, Erin O’Reilly spoke to RedFM news to say that the pandemic has forced the centre to rethink how they could help more people with eating disorders.

The centre have 125 clients this year and a further 40 people waiting to be allocated a therapist or be assessed – that’s compared to 75 clients last year.

There is a clear desire for treatment and this significant increase means the centre are now looking at ways to treat more clients.

“We’re trying to find another way to support our clientele- maybe doing group sessions, information; maybe psychoeducation pre treatment, which could cut out a lot of time and effort really. You get the young people in to do psychoeducation around eating disorders, what it does to your body, body image, a lot of stuff can be learned as a group, but the one on one counselling sessions are really very, very important than after that.”