Kartini Clinic for Children and Families

Pediatric Eating Disorder Treatment Program

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971-319-6800
  • Eating Disorder Treatment
    • Anorexia Nervosa
      • Signs & Symptoms: Anorexia
      • Causes and Triggers: Anorexia
      • Treatment: Anorexia
    • Bulimia Nervosa
      • Signs & Symptoms: Bulimia
      • Causes and Triggers: Bulimia
      • Treatment: Bulimia
    • Food Phobia
      • Signs & Symptoms: Food Phobia
      • Causes and Triggers: Food Phobia
      • Treatment: Food Phobia
    • ARFID
    • Treatment Overview
      • Inpatient
      • Partial Hospitalization (PHP)
      • Intensive Outpatient (IOP)
      • Virtual Intensive Outpatient (VIOP)
      • Outpatient
      • Cost of Treatment
  • Eating Disorder Resources
    • For Referring Providers
      • Hospitalization Criteria
      • Direct Referrals
    • Kartini School
    • For Parents & Guardians
      • Top Tips for Parents
      • Understanding Your Insurance
      • Talking to Your Employer
      • Insurance FAQ
      • Mental Health Parity Law
      • Family Housing Information
      • School During Treatment
      • Give Food a Chance
    • Research & Resources
    • Eating Disorder Treatment Videos
    • Glossary of Eating Disorder Terms
  • About Kartini Clinic
    • Why Kartini is Different
    • Will Treatment Work?
    • Our Staff
      • Julie O’Toole MD MPH
      • Naghmeh Moshtael MD
      • Shanna Greene
      • Morgan O’Toole
      • Megan Maples
      • Sherrill Gandsey RN
      • Leslie Weisner LMFT
      • Steve Nemirow
      • Amy Stauffer
      • Alex Garcia MA
      • Lisa Peacock LMFT
    • Contact Us
    • Careers at Kartini
  • Blog
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    • YouTube

Will Treatment Work?

Does treatment at Kartini Clinic work?

Yes. Kartini Clinic’s integrated treatment program, with its strong emphasis on prompt and adequate weight restoration followed by family-centered  psychotherapy, incorporates the very latest in evidence-based eating disorder treatment.

What is Kartini Clinic’s “success rate”?

Most patients who do not receive appropriate treatment can expect a re-hospitalization rate of roughly 40%. At Kartini, for those patients who complete our treatment program, including tailored aftercare treatment, our rate is about 10% after one year. But rather than try to convince you with claims of success rates, our primary goal is to explain what we have found to work and why we think it does. In the case of anorexia, we do not want to paint an overly rosy picture of treatment success or “cures.” As anyone who has a loved one with anorexia or suffered from it themselves can tell you, treatment can often be a long and frustrating process. But this process is one that is emphatically not without hope for a return to a rewarding and fulfilling life.

What works (and what doesn’t)?

Successful eating disorder treatment involves a number of factors; some of the most important are listed below. Any treatment program that does not truly incorporate these factors is not – in our professional opinion – delivering the best evidence-based eating disorder treatment.

Family-Centered

Recent clinical trials have shown family-centered eating disorder programs to be the best known method to secure lasting remission in children with severe eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa. We practice only family-centered treatment. Parents should not accept substitutes; many eating disorder treatment programs tout themselves as “Maudsley” programs, but to be a true family-centered program it should include weekly family therapy (with the patient) over the entire course of treatment, family-based meals and parent training in how to care for an eating disorder child. The occasional phone call to parents is NOT family-centered treatment.

Coordinated Care

Because Kartini provides medical stabilization (if needed) as a seamless part of our program, many of our patients get a level of coordinated care unavailable at most other treatment facilities. Most treatment facilities will not accept medically unstable patients; if they do they usually admit them to a psychiatric ward and later discharge them to a separate eating disorder program with an entirely different team of providers that your child must then learn to trust. We believe strongly that this is not the best standard of care for children with eating disorders. Children are not adults and should not be expected to respond like adults in treatment. They require specialized care that is sensitive to their needs. Our patients never leave our care, from the day they are admitted to day when they return to their primary care providers in their own communities.

Weight Restoration First

Without prompt and adequate weight restoration, no amount of psychotherapy will help to secure lasting remission. If your child is in a treatment program where weight gain is not mandatory (or is not occurring after two weeks of treatment, at most), you should find a different program immediately. Never “argue with the illness” Successful treatment, especially in children and young adults, ultimately does not depend on a patient’s “willingness” to be treated when they are in the depths of the illness. Anorexia is a brain disorder.

Eating disorders are brain disorders

Too often treatment programs spend countless hours “arguing with the illness,” that is, trying to convince someone with a brain disorder to behave rationally. This simply does not work.

Multi-disciplinary Care

Physiological and psychological remission is secured through the use of a multi-disciplinary treatment team. While our treatment program emphasizes the medical aspects of eating disorder treatment, this does not mean we fail to address the “whole person.” Our treatment team includes group, individual and family therapists, movement therapists, a hypno-therapist, and a licensed school teacher (for patients in our Partial Hospitilization program aka “day treatment”).

Day Treatment

Eating disorder treatment is often required over a number of years; an important focus of treatment is therefore to reduce the level of treatment intensity over time. At Kartini Clinic our goal is to secure lasting results and to limit the most intensive (and expensive) forms of treatment such as hospitalization and 24-hour residential care. We achieve results by first addressing immediate symptoms of anorexia (e.g. weight loss, irrational fear of being fat, etc.) in the controlled environment of the Kartini Partial Hospitilization program (day treatment) while simultaneously teaching parents of young patients how to care for them at home as much as possible. For young adults the goal is to teach them techniques for independent living. Medical stabilization, family therapy and other forms of psycho-therapeutic treatments are designed to gain remission and prevent the need for (re)hospitalization and/or residential treatment. Treatment of eating disorders such as anorexia is complicated, time-consuming and often quite expensive. Kartini Clinic’s program is designed to be clear about the nature of the illness, the treatment steps that are necessary to secure lasting improvements in health, and to minimize the cost of treatment by preventing the most intensive forms of it.

Recent Blog Posts

Are social media platforms making eating disorders in children worse?

January 10, 2023 By Morgan O'Toole-Smith

School During Eating Disorder Treatment? Not To Worry

October 13, 2022 By Morgan O'Toole-Smith

Online Reviews

September 23, 2021 By Morgan O'Toole-Smith

New to Treatment? Don’t Panic!

February 10, 2022 By Julie O'Toole

Kartini School: A Success Story

February 9, 2022 By Morgan O'Toole-Smith

Tips for Motivating Kids in School

January 19, 2021 By Morgan O'Toole-Smith

  • Eating Disorder Treatment
    • Anorexia Nervosa
      • Signs & Symptoms: Anorexia
      • Causes and Triggers: Anorexia
      • Treatment: Anorexia
    • Bulimia Nervosa
      • Signs & Symptoms: Bulimia
      • Causes and Triggers: Bulimia
      • Treatment: Bulimia
    • Food Phobia
      • Signs & Symptoms: Food Phobia
      • Causes and Triggers: Food Phobia
      • Treatment: Food Phobia
    • ARFID
    • Treatment Overview
      • Inpatient
      • Partial Hospitalization (PHP)
      • Virtual Intensive Outpatient (VIOP)
      • Intensive Outpatient (IOP)
      • Outpatient
      • Cost of Treatment
  • Eating Disorder Resources
    • For Referring Providers
      • Hospitalization Criteria
      • Direct Referrals
    • For Parents & Guardians
      • Top Tips for Parents
      • Understanding Your Insurance
      • Talking to Your Employer
      • Insurance FAQ
      • Mental Health Parity Law
      • Family Housing Information
      • School During Treatment
      • Give Food a Chance
    • Kartini School
    • Research & Resources
    • Treatment Videos
    • Glossary of Eating Disorder Terms
  • About Kartini Clinic
    • Why Kartini is Different
    • Will Treatment Work?
    • Our Staff
    • Contact Us
    • Careers at Kartini

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How to Recognize Eating Disorders in Boys

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVgVmDIXqHc

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From Our Blog

Are social media platforms making eating disorders in children worse?

January 10, 2023

At least one school district in Seattle thinks so. Seattle Public Schools (SPS) has filed a suit in US DIstrict Court alleging that “defendants [social media platforms such as Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat] affirmatively recommend and promote harmful content to youth, such as … Read Post...

School During Eating Disorder Treatment? Not To Worry

October 13, 2022

During the school year, families are sometimes hesitant to have their child enter treatment in the Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP) because they are worried about time away from school. The teachers at Kartini School understand your concern.  Often, our patients are super-conscientious … Read Post...

Online Reviews

September 23, 2021

This post is from Kartini Clinic CEO Morgan O'Toole.  Online reviews have become part of our everyday lives. Who hasn’t glanced at the star ratings when Googling a new hair salon or looking for a restaurant to try out? Most of the time, online reviews are just another useful data point when … Read Post...

New to Treatment? Don’t Panic!

February 10, 2022

Your child has been diagnosed with an eating disorder by one of the doctors at Kartini Clinic. Whether this is a restricting disorder with fear of fat, a bingeing and purging disorder or what we call ARFID (avoidant restrictive food intake disorder), it matters little.  What matters is that the … Read Post...

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The Kartini Clinic Difference

At Kartini Clinic we practice only evidence-based, family-centered eating disorder treatment. Our program is a multi-disciplinary medical and psychiatric treatment model rather than an exclusively psychiatric approach to eating disorder treatment.  read more »

Eating Disorder Quick Links

Anorexia Nervosa
Bulimia Nervosa
Eating Disorder Treatment

Resource Quick Links

Referring Providers
Parent Resources
Understanding Insurance

Contact Us

Tel: (971) 319-6800
Fax: (503) 282-3409

help@kartiniclinic.com

3530 N Vancouver, Suite 400
Portland, OR 97227

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Mon – Fri 9:00am – 5:00pm

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