The United States is in an eating disorder crisis, making it more important than ever for healthcare providers to understand how to diagnose and treat these potentially deadly illnesses.

To achieve this, it’s important that there be clear and agreed-upon standards of care—which is why we’re pleased to share our latest published research.

The paper, titled “United States-based practice guidelines for children and adolescents with eating disorders,” was published in the Journal of Eating Disorders on April 11, 2025, and was co-authored by Equip researchers alongside other leading experts in the field. It outlines the current state of guidelines for treating eating disorders in young people, recommends best practices for diagnosis and treatment, and identifies important areas for research and improvement going forward. We’ve highlighted key takeaways below, and you can also read the published paper for a more in-depth discussion.

How we developed our guidelines

Several professional organizations in the U.S. provide their own guidelines for assessing and treating eating disorders in children and adolescents. These organizations include:

• the American Psychiatric Association (APA)
• the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine (SAHM)
• the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP)
• the American Academy for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP)

In June of 2023, The Kennedy Forum and Equip brought together leaders from all of these organizations as well as other stakeholders—such as health systems, payors, policy advocates, and people with lived experience recovering from an eating disorder—for a summit to review current eating disorder treatment guidelines. The published paper highlights key areas of alignment across these different guidelines, identifies recommended standards of care, and points out future opportunities for research.

Key takeaways

Out of the summit discussion, several clear recommendations emerged. When it comes to effectively diagnosing and treating eating disorders in adolescents and children, these four tenets are both agreed upon and extremely important:

1. Primary care providers should routinely screen for eating disorders to enable early detection and treatment referrals.
2. The initial and preferred treatment for eating disorders in young people is outpatient treatment, with family involvement, including family-based treatment (FBT).
3. The diverse health impacts of eating disorders can be effectively addressed by multidisciplinary treatment teams, encompassing mental, nutritional, and physical health.
4. Hospitalization may be necessary for patients who meet certain medical criteria, such as bradycardia or specific lab abnormalities.

These takeaways are validating rather than surprising—evidence has long shown that early intervention is crucial, that multidisciplinary treatment is key, and that outpatient care should be a first-line treatment as long as a patient is medically stable. But identifying this alignment is important, because it allows there to be a universal standard of care that can be used to educate and empower providers across the country.

At Equip, multidisciplinary care is a core component of our treatment, with each patient and family getting access to a dedicated care team that includes a therapist, dietitian, medical provider, and mentors. We also emphasize the importance of family involvement, and generally use FBT (which is the gold standard for eating disorder treatment in young people) with pediatric patients. We’re also committed to educating healthcare providers of all types on how to screen for eating disorders, so that fewer people slip through the cracks. To learn more about screening for eating disorders, you can watch our recorded Equip Academy presentation on eating disorder screening, or read the written summary of the event.

It’s also important to highlight the gaps and opportunities identified during the summit. Specifically, we recommend future research focus on:

• Treatment for avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID)
• Weight-inclusive care
• Validated screening tools for children and adolescents

Our research team will prioritize these focus areas going forward, as part of our ongoing mission to make sure everyone affected by an eating disorder gets access to effective, evidence-based treatment.

Read the full paper.