Expert Psychiatric Support for Eating Disorder Recovery in Orlando

An eating disorder is so much more than what you do or don't eat—it's a complex and serious illness that affects your thoughts, your emotions, and your physical health. Lasting recovery requires specialized care, and my role is to provide the crucial psychiatric support you need. I work as a dedicated partner on your treatment team, providing care for both adolescents and adults here in my Orlando office and across Central Florida communities like Lake Nona, Windermere, and Winter Park.

Understanding Eating Disorders

Eating disorders are not simply about food; they often involve intricate emotional and psychological factors. Common types include:

Anorexia Nervosa: Characterized by severe restriction of food intake leading to significantly low body weight, intense fear of gaining weight, and distorted body image.
Bulimia Nervosa: Involves recurrent episodes of binge eating followed by compensatory behaviors (like purging, excessive exercise, or laxative use) to prevent weight gain, often accompanied by self-worth overly tied to body shape.
Binge Eating Disorder (BED): Marked by recurrent episodes of eating large amounts of food rapidly, often feeling a loss of control during the binge, followed by distress or guilt, but without regular compensatory behaviors.
Other Specified Feeding or Eating Disorder (OSFED): Includes individuals with significant eating disorder symptoms that don't meet the full criteria for Anorexia, Bulimia, or BED.
Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID): Characterized by limiting the amount or type of food consumed, but not due to body image concerns (e.g., due to sensory issues, fear of choking, lack of interest).

Recognizing warning signs and seeking professional help early is critical.

Why a Multidisciplinary Team Approach is Essential

Effective eating disorder treatment requires a coordinated team of specialists working together. This typically includes:

Therapist/Psychologist: Provides specialized psychotherapy (like CBT-E, DBT, FBT) to address thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.
Registered Dietitian/Nutritionist: Guides nutritional rehabilitation and helps restore healthy eating patterns.
Medical Doctor/Primary Care Physician: Monitors physical health complications.
Psychiatrist (like Dr. Narang at ACES Psychiatry): Provides specialized psychiatric assessment, diagnosis, and management.

Understanding the Role of a Psychiatrist in Eating Disorder Treatment

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I want to be clear from the start: an eating disorder is not a choice or a failure of willpower. It is a serious, complex psychiatric condition that requires specialized medical care. My specific role as a psychiatrist is to manage the medical and neurobiological aspects of your recovery. I work in close partnership with your therapist and dietitian, creating a unified team to support you from every angle. My role focuses on:

Comprehensive Psychiatric Evaluation: Assessing your mental health history, eating disorder symptoms, and identifying any co-occurring psychiatric conditions (like anxiety, depression, OCD, PTSD) which are very common.
Diagnosis: Providing an accurate diagnosis of the specific eating disorder and any co-existing mental health conditions.
Medication Management: Expertly prescribing and monitoring medications primarily to treat co-occurring conditions (e.g., managing severe anxiety or depression that hinders recovery) or, in specific cases where evidence supports it (like SSRIs for bulimia or BED), addressing certain eating disorder symptoms. Medication is typically an adjunct, not a primary treatment, for the core eating disorder.
Monitoring Mental and Physical Stability: Assessing mental status, medication effectiveness and side effects, and liaising with the medical team regarding psychiatric aspects of physical health.
Collaboration and Coordination: Working closely and communicating regularly with your therapist, dietitian, and primary care physician to ensure an integrated and effective treatment plan. Our collaborative approach is central to our practice.
Addressing Underlying Factors: Helping to understand potential contributing factors, such as the impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences, and reducing stigma by challenging mental health myths.

From my clinical experience, I know that the eating disorder often serves a purpose—it can be a way to cope with overwhelming emotions. My goal is never to simply ‘take away’ that coping mechanism. Instead, we work together, along with your therapist, to build stronger, healthier coping skills first, so that letting go of the disorder feels possible and safe.

ACES Psychiatry

Expert Psychiatric Support for Eating Disorder Recovery in Orlando