Record number of anorexic children force-fed by NHS
Chemical castration and shock therapy also on rise
RECORD numbers of children in Scotland are being force-fed as the NHS takes extreme measures to tackle severe eating disorders.
Figures show an alarming rise in cases where doctors have had to administer ‘artificial nutrition’ to patients to keep them alive.
Last year, 99 patients, 51 of them under 18, were deemed to be so close to death, medics ruled they must be fed – even though they had not given their consent.
Cases of compulsory feeding have tripled over ten years – reflecting the growing number of Scots suffering eating disorders.
The rise in cases emerged in a report by watchdog the Mental Welfare Commission.
It records the number of compulsory treatments ordered by doctors where patients are either deemed incapable of giving meaningful consent, or else have refused to give consent to a treatment the medics believe is vital.
Other compulsory treatments which rose over the past decade include Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) and chemical castration, where patients, who are often sex offenders, are given drugs to reduce their sex drive.
Such interventions can only be ordered if doctors give satisfactory reasons why compulsory treatment is in the patient’s best interest.
These are defined as saving someone’s life, stopping severe suffering or preventing deterioration in the patient’s condition.
Dr Gary Morrison, executive director of the commission, is worried treatments are not giving patients enough protection.
He said: ‘In recent years the number of times the Mental Health Act has been used to give people compulsory treatment for mental illness has risen steadily.’
Since 2001, the number of T3 forms signed – which allow a doctor to administer treatment without a patient’s consent – has quadrupled from 25 to 99 this year. Since 2011, the number of children given artificial nutrition has more than doubled.
The treatment sees tubes forced into a patient’s nose and nutritionrich liquid pumped into their stomachs. The process gained notoriety at the start of the last century, when suffragettes jailed while campaigning for votes for women went on hunger strike and were routinely force-fed.
Dr Fiona Duffy, from the Scottish Eating Disorder Interest Group, is calling on the Scottish Government to make early-stage care more readily available to stop anorexia before force-feeding is needed.
Anorexia – the biggest killer of any psychiatric disorder – typically sees patients try to lose as much weight as possible. While controversial, force-feeding is seen for many as a necessary treatment.
The figures also show a rise in patients receiving ECT without consent – up from 142 people in 2007 to 176 this year. Chemical castration was also administered to ten people in the past year.