Dr. Ulrike Schmidt
Dr Ulrike Schmidt is a world-leading expert in eating disorders and early intervention, with decades of clinical and research experience. As a Professor of Eating Disorders at King...
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Who are you?
My name is Ika Schmidt. I'm professor of eating disorders at King's College London. In my spare time, I like walking in the mountains. The steeper the better.
What is your professional background?
I'm a medical doctor by training and specialised in psychiatry, and for the last 25 years or so, I have worked in particular with people with eating disorders. I have worked and still work clinically and in research, and my particular research interests are to do with developing better, faster, and more effective treatments for people with eating disorders.
What is an Eating disorder?
Eating disorders. The term is really an umbrella term that covers a range of different disorders from anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder, and a group of people who have a mixture of symptoms. What they all have in common is that there are changes in how people eat and how much they eat. So this goes from persistent undereating and self starvation to persistent overeating and episodic overeating. And in the case of bulimia nervosa, which sits in the middle between anorexia nervosa and binge eating disorder, people alternate between starving and bingeing. What drives this is that people often have a great fear of getting fat and have extreme concerns about their weight, shape, and appearance, and you may ask what drives those kind of thoughts. Often there are other underlying psychological issues and stressors that drive a person into putting such extreme value onto weight, shape, and appearance, and then acting accordingly.