Ashoka
Only 20% Of People With Eating Disorders Get Help. This Startup Is Out To Change That.
More than 30 million Americans with eating disorders don’t get the treatment they need to fully recover — and against common assumptions, these disorders affect people equally across genders, races, ethnicities, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status. Through Equip, which launched last month, founders Kristina Saffran and Erin Parks, Ph.D., are on a mission to transform and expand treatment options through Family-Based Treatment that can be delivered at home. They sat down with mental health advocate, former Representative Patrick J. Kennedy, to discuss their vision.
Ashoka insight
It’s unfortunately a radical idea that families are best equipped to help their children and their loved ones through illness. What's happening right now is that there are a lot of people, a lot of adolescents in one-to-one therapy. The parents are really excluded from treatment. In Family Based Treatment, we task the parents with structuring the home environment for pro-health behaviors.