Join us for the 2025 Judy Dunn International Conference, bringing together leading experts to share the latest evidence and clinical insights on eating disorders in young people. This year’s programme will explore current research and innovations in understanding these conditions and their treatment, offering delegates deeper perspectives to inform their work with children and adolescents.
Confirmed speakers: Professor Tamsin Ford, Professor Clare Llewellyn, Professor Joana Steinglass, Professor Jennifer Joanne Thomas, Dr. Mima Simic, and Dr. Fiona Duffy.
Confirmed chair: Professor Nadia Micali
Booking
Sign up at this link or on the Book Now button at the top of the screen, and complete the form that follows. You’ll then receive an email confirmation and a link to the webinar, plus we’ll send you a calendar reminder nearer the time. Delegates will have exclusive access to recordings for 90 days after the event, together with slides. Plus you will get a personalised CPD/CME certificate via email.
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EARLY BIRD £99 (until 28/11/25, then £119) for ACAMH Members (Print, Online, Concession) Join now and save
EARLY BIRD £159 (until 28/11/25, then £179) ACAMH Learn Account holders
EARLY BIRD £159 (until 28/11/25, then £179) Non Members
£5 ACAMH Undergraduate/Postgraduate Members
FREE LMIC Members
Don’t forget as a charity any surplus made is reinvested back as we work to our vision of ‘Sharing best evidence, improving practice’, and our mission to ‘Improve the mental health and wellbeing of young people aged 0-25’.
About the talks
Professor Tamsin Ford CBE – Recent epidemiological findings on eating disorders in children and adolescents
This talk will discuss the definition of eating difficulties and eating disorders and report on global prevalence before focusing on findings from the trends between 2017 and 2023 in the Mental Health of Children and Young People in England and the Oxwell survey. It will complete with some practice work on supporting transition to adult services.
Learning outcomes
- To understand the difference between eating disorders and eating difficulties
- To understand current population trends in eating disorders and eating difficulties among young people
- To reflect on supporting transition to adult services for those who need it
Dr. Fiona Duffy – Autism and eating disorders
The talk will focus on an overview of the literature surrounding autism and eating disorders, before moving on to pragmatic techniques that clinicians can use to support the effective assessment and treatment of Autistic individuals with eating disorders.
Learning outcomes
- To understand the link between autism and eating disorders
- To understand unique considerations in the assessment and treatment of Autistic individuals with eating disorders
- To increase awareness of practical tools that can be used to support treatment
Professor Clare Llewellyn – Early eating behaviour as a risk marker for later eating disorders
Children differ widely in how they respond to food and the opportunity to eat, and these early eating behaviours may help to explain why some young people are more vulnerable to developing eating disorders. Traits such as being highly responsive to external food cues (wanting to eat in response to the sight, smell or taste of palatable food) or having low satiety sensitivity (internal feelings of fullness) can be measured reliably in infancy and childhood, tend to remain fairly stable over time, and show a moderate to high genetic component. New findings from large longitudinal studies show that these early behaviours are linked to later eating/feeding disorder symptoms in adolescence. For example, higher food responsiveness and lower satiety responsiveness at age 4–5 predict more binge-type and restrictive symptoms at 12–14 years, while heightened sensitivity to satiety and slow feeding in infancy predict later symptoms of avoidant restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID). The talk will outline these emerging developmental pathways and consider how parental feeding practices – such as structured and responsive approaches – can shape early eating behaviour, as well as the potential and limitations of using eating behaviour phenotypes to inform future prevention efforts.
Learning outcomes
- To understand the range of eating behaviours expressed in early childhood, and how these behaviours are measured
- To understand the extent to which individual differences in childhood eating behaviours are shaped by genetic and environmental factors
- To understand emerging longitudinal evidence linking early eating behaviours to later eating and feeding disorder symptoms
- To understand how parental feeding practices can help shape early eating behaviours
- To understand the potential and limitations of using eating behaviour phenotypes to inform future prevention efforts
Dr. Jennifer Thomas – Treatment targets for avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder: From brain to behavior
Avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID) is a common and impairing disorder in both children and adults across the globe. Individuals with ARFID have difficulties consuming sufficient volume or variety of food due to sensory sensitivity, lack of interest in eating, and/or fear of aversive consequences of eating. Our team’s recent research points toward key differences in appetite-regulating hormones and neural response to food cues that may contribute to or maintain ARFID symptoms. Cognitive-behavioral therapy for ARFID (CBT-AR) has shown early promise in the treatment of ARFID across the age spectrum, and is currently being evaluated in two randomized controlled trials. Early data suggest that CBT-AR may lead to mechanistic changes in both neural and endocrine mechanisms of ARFID, and highlight avenues for improving treatments of this common and impairing disorder.
Learning outcomes
- To recognize key differences between individuals with avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID) and healthy controls in brain, endocrine response, and behavior.
- To understand the core interventions of cognitive behavioral therapy for ARFID (CBT-AR) and how to apply them across common clinical presentations.
- To appreciate how CBT-AR may lead to behavioral, neural, and endocrine changes and highlight avenues for treatment refinement.
Dr. Joanna Steinglass – Neural Mechanisms Underlying Anorexia Nervosa and the Clinical Applications
Anorexia nervosa is a multifaceted illness, yet the central behavioral disturbance associated with morbidity and chronicity of illness is the persistent and maladaptive restriction of food intake. The past decade has yielded numerous advances in understanding the neuroscience of this behavior (though many questions remain). One specific advance is the identification of frontostriatal circuits that guide food choices. Studies that link brain and behavior have shown that patients with anorexia nervosa engage dorsal fronto-striatal regions when deciding what to eat, whereas healthy peers do not, and that this pattern of brain activation relates to both persistence and remission of illness. Neural findings are part of conceptualizing the behaviors that contribute to persistence of illness as habits, meaning that the cues are more salient than the outcomes and the dorsal frontostriatal circuits are more relevant than ventral reward circuits. Evidence for this model of illness can be seen across the age span, from adolescents through adulthood. This brain-based model of illness can be part of patient care and has been the basis of novel treatment development approaches.
Learning outcomes
- Explain anorexia nervosa as a neurobiological illness.
- Describe neural mechanisms of pathological restrictive eating behavior in adolescents and young adults with anorexia nervosa.
- To recognize the role of habits and habit mechanisms in patient care for anorexia nervosa.
Dr. Mima Simic – Reconceptualising Family Therapy for Anorexia Nervosa: Understanding Therapeutic Change Through Family Perspectives
We will describe the evolution of conceptualisations in family therapy for anorexia nervosa, highlighting the shift toward a clearly formulation-driven approach that can be adapted for neurodivergent young people. The talk will examine how families understand and describe therapeutic change in anorexia nervosa, drawing on qualitative insights and clinical experience. The session will conclude with reflections on how family perspectives can inform more responsive and effective clinical practice.
Learning outcomes
- To understand how families describe therapeutic change in anorexia nervosa
- To recognise how formulation-driven family therapy can be adapted for neurodivergent young people
- To consider how family perspectives can inform more responsive and effective clinical decision-making
Programme
09:30 Welcome and introduction – Chair, Professor Nadia Micali
09:40 Professor Tamsin Ford CBE – Recent epidemiological findings on eating disorders in children and adolescents
10:10 Q&A
10:20 Dr. Fiona Duffy – Autism and eating disorders
10:50 Q&A
11:00 Refreshment and reflection break
11:15 Professor Clare Llewellyn – Early eating behaviour as a risk marker for later eating disorders
11:45 Q&A
11:55 Lunch break
13:05 Welcome to the afternoon session – Chair, Professor Nadia Micali
13:10 Dr. Joanna Steinglass – Neural Mechanisms Underlying Anorexia Nervosa and the Clinical Applications
13:40 Q&A
13:50 Dr. Jennifer Thomas – Treatment targets for avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder: From brain to behavior
14:20 Q&A
14:30 Refreshment and reflection break
14:45 Dr. Mima Simic – Reconceptualising Family Therapy for Anorexia Nervosa: Understanding Therapeutic Change Through Family Perspectives
15:15 Q&A
15:25 Closing remarks – Chair, Professor Nadia Micali
15:30 End
Interactive overview
Use the interactive programme below to gain an overview of the topic, meet the speaker, test your knowledge, and a whole lot more!
About the speakers
Nadia Micali, Prof. of Psychiatry, MD, MRCPsych, Ph.D., FAED. Nadia is one of the world-leading researchers in the field of child and adolescent eating disorders. She is Head of Center for Eating and feeding Disorders Research in Denmark, and a professor of Psychiatry at the University of Copenhagen. Prof Micali has a long standing clinical and research expertise (of almost 20 years) of looking after patients with eating disorders and their families. Prof Micali was trained at the Maudsley Hospital, London, UK, in Psychiatry, and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (2000-2008), where she specialised in eating disorders and worked as consultant psychiatrist of the child and adolescent and adult programs (2008-2011). She worked between 2002 and 2008 with Prof Ivan Eisler, who developed FT-AN, which (together with its US counterpart FBT) is the treatment with the largest evidence base for adolescent AN. Between 2015-2017 she was medical director of the clinical and research program for eating disorders (across all ages) at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, US. In 2018 following her taking up leadership of the Hospital-based Child and adolescent psychiatry department at HUG, Geneva, she founded the clinical feeding and eating disorders treatment program for children and adolescents in Geneva and led this until her departure from Geneva in 2022. Throughout the years Nadia has worked with carers, sufferers, and families on several research projects.
Tamsin Ford CBE, is a Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Head of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on the effectiveness of interventions and the efficiency of services in relation to the mental health of children and young people, with a particular focus on the interface between education and health systems. She completed her PhD at the Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College London and she set up the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Research Group at Exeter Medical School in 2007. She moved to Cambridge in October 2019 where she is also an honorary consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist at Cambridge and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust. She is part of the Research Advisory Group of Place2Be and was on the Board of the Association of Child and Adolescent Mental Health between 2011 and 2025
Clare Llewelly is Professor of Psychology and Epidemiology in the Department of Behavioural Science and Health at UCL, where she Co-Directs UCL-REACH (Research into Eating, ACtivity and Health). Her research focuses on the intersection between obesity and eating disorders, and identifying common early life risk factors for both, with a view to developing inclusive prevention interventions and policies. She is Co-Director of the NIHR Healthy Weight Policy Research Unit and leads Gemini, a UK twin birth cohort exploring genetic and environmental contributions to growth and eating disorders in childhood and adolescence. She is passionate about science communication and has published books for parents and caregivers about feeding practices in the early years.
Dr. Fiona Duffy is a Senior Lecturer at Edinburgh University and a Consultant Clinical Psychologist in NHS Lothian Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service. Fiona is the co-lead investigator of the Eating Disorder and Autism Collaborative (EDAC; edacresearch.co.uk) a UKRI/MRF/NIHR jointly funded research network bringing together the autism and eating disorder research fields, working collaboratively with Autistic people with lived experience.
Dr. Joanna Steinglass, MD is a Professor of Psychiatry and the Director of Research in the Eating Disorders Clinic at the New York State Psychiatric Institute/Columbia University Irving Medical Center. Dr. Steinglass graduated from Amherst College and Harvard Medical School. She completed her psychiatry training at Columbia University. Dr. Steinglass’ research investigates Anorexia Nervosa through study of the neural mechanisms of illness and the development of mechanism-based treatments. She conducts interdisciplinary research that uses tools from cognitive and computational neuroscience to apply the latest understanding of the healthy brain to research on Anorexia Nervosa. She applies these insights to the development of behavioral, neuromodulatory, and pharmacological interventions.
Dr. Jennifer Thomas is the Co-director of the Eating Disorders Clinical and Research Program at Massachusetts General Hospital, and Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Thomas’s research focuses on avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder and other feeding and eating disorders, as described in her >200 scientific articles and five books — including Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder: Children, Adolescents, and Adults; and The Picky Eater’s Recovery Book: Overcoming Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder. She is principal investigator on several studies investigating the neurobiology and treatment of avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder, funded by the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health and private foundations. She has served as President of the Eating Disorders Research Society, President of the Academy for Eating Disorders, and Associate Editor for the International Journal of Eating Disorders.
Dr Mima Simic, MSc, MD, MRCPsych is Joint Head of the Maudsley Centre for Child and Adolescent Eating Disorders (MCCAED) and a Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist. She has published over 80 peer-reviewed papers, co-authored 14 book chapters, and three books: Cutting Down: An Evidence-Based CBT Workbook for Treating Young People Who Self-Harm (first and second editions), Multi-Family Therapy for Anorexia Nervosa, and The Radically Open DBT Workbook for Eating Disorders. Her research focuses on treatments for young people with eating disorders, depression, and self-harm. Dr Simic is a senior RO-DBT clinician, and a senior trainer and supervisor in Maudsley family therapy and multi-family therapy for eating disorders. From 2009 to 2018, she was Consultant to the Adolescent DBT team at the Maudsley Hospital. In 2010, she led the development of the Intensive Day Treatment Programme (ITP) for restrictive eating disorders, which integrates RO-DBT with family and multi-family therapy. She is currently an expert member of several NHS England advisory groups, contributing to the development of national standards for the treatment of child and adolescent eating disorders.