Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to support families with children suffering from Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder.

Commissioning pathways for avoidant restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID) are locally determined by integrated care boards. All eating disorder teams should work collaboratively with other children and young people’s community teams to address co-occurring conditions as needed.

NHS England recognises the importance of patient-centre care, tailored to meet the needs of children and young people with varied presentations, including ARFID, and the children and young people’s eating disorder guidance is currently being updated to reflect this. The intention is for the updated guidance to increase the focus on early identification of and intervention in eating disorders including ARFID and to highlight the importance of a truly integrated approach which takes account of the needs of the patient, their family and/or carers.