example case study - luk and agoha

Question 1

what was the aim?

Answer 1

• to describe the experience of chinese- american adolescent girl with AN using a case study from multiple perspectives

Question 2

what was the sample?

Answer 2

• 15 year old girl called amy
• diagnosed at 13 and showed severe calorie restriction and excessive exercise
• BMI = 11.8

Question 3

what care did she recieve?

Answer 3

• transferred to the child/adolescent psychiatric ward
• underwent individual and group therapy, daily weigh ins and monitoring of meals
• discharged after 3 months and goal weight was reached

Question 4

what was her background?

Answer 4

• family meal times were significant
• highly argumentative with her mother and often had emotional outbursts with her at appointments
• didn’t want to eat at home

Question 5

describe her recovery process

Answer 5

• consistently made it to appointments on her own
• continued to refuse meals with family and opted to prepare her own at home
• successfully gained a part time job at a cookie store

Question 6

how was the data gathered interpreted?

Answer 6

• consistent with developmental theories (maternal nurturance lacking)
• cultural clash between her friends and parents (chose to reject ancestral culture through food)

Question 7

what were the strengths of this case study?

Answer 7

• parental and youth consent gained
• inpatient and outpatient data reviewed = triangulation
• quantitative data gathered e.g. BMI = objective

Question 8

what are the weakness of the case study?

Answer 8

• retrospective review data already exists so may be interpreted differently by different people
• small sample size of one girl = low G
• Chinese-American so may not find the same results in different cultures