Dr. James Mitchell, an internationally renowned expert in eating disorders, discusses the two most common types of night eating syndrome.  He will be presenting this topic at the upcoming symposium on April 12, 2008, hosted by The Center for Eating Disorders at Sheppard Pratt.

What is night eating syndrome? 

There exist at least two forms of night eating syndrome, or NES. The first, most commonly referred to as NES, involves people who overeat late in the day and/or get up during the night to eat. These people also have marked problems with insomnia and are fully aware of what they are doing when they wake up to eat. The other form of night eating is usually related to a sleep-related eating disorder. Those individuals wake up and eat during the night, but many times are amnestic for it and are only partially aware of what they are doing. This type of night eating is a parasomnia, much like sleepwalking. 

How does an individual identify that they are struggling with this issue?

People with NES are usually fully aware of their problem. Those with a sleep-related eating disorder may be amnestic for the eating episodes, but may discover evidence the following day that they have been eating during the night; such as food that has been left out, or that the oven has been left on.

Is there effective treatment available for NES? 

There is a structured form of counseling which has been manualized and is available as a self-help manual by Allison & Stunkard for NES.  For sleep related eating disorder, medications are usually indicated and can be quite effective.

Read more about Dr. James Mitchell.

If you are a mental health professional and are interested in hearing Dr. Mitchell speak on this subject, you can register for the April 12th symposium online at www.eventville.com/sheppardpratt