EDANI: NI website offers support for eating disorders
A new website has been launched in Northern Ireland to help those who are living with eating disorders.
It will also provide support for their family and friends.
The new Eating Disorder Association Northern Ireland website aims to create awareness about conditions such an anorexia, bulimia and binge eating.
Ann McCann from EDANI said children as young as 10 or 11 were coping with eating disorders and their parents were contacting her organisation every week.
"With our new interactive website, we hope to target much younger people who need help," she said.
"When I started this 20 years ago it would have been very rare for a parent to phone me to talk about a child aged under 13 or 14 years.
"Now, every week, we get calls from parents and they're talking abut children as young as 10 and 11 that have already got the early stages of eating disorders.
Ms McCann said the secret of success in treating an eating disorder was getting help in those very early months before it becomes a way of life.
"It is a life-threatening illness," she said. "It is devastating for the family to have to deal with it. We want to get the message out that early diagnosis is the secret of success."
She said the association had made the website more interactive as their experience is that pre-teens and teenagers are more likely to look for help online.
Eating Disorders Awareness Week runs from 23 to 27 February.