Eating Disorders in Relationship with Dietary Habits among Pharmacy Students in Romania

Abstract

Changing dietary habits of university students is due to personal, social, educational or religious factors. The relationship between dietary habits and presence of eating disorders among university students is less known in Romania. Material and Methods: Ninety-one pharmacy students (91.21% women) were included in the research. Socio-demographic, anthropometric, medical, and psychological data were collected. Dietary self-declared habits were registered. The analysis of data was done using SPSS, v23. Results: A total of 69.2% of students had normal weight, 64.84% preferred to have lunch, and 23.08% eat during nights. The majority of subjects (95.6%), stated that they eat snacks daily. More than one-third of students keep diets to reduce their weight. Younger students tend to eat more main meals per week, snack more, and eat later after getting up in the morning. Subjects with high body dissatisfaction tended to have fewer main meals (r = −0.265, p = 0.011) and to skip breakfasts (−0.235, p = 0.025) and dinners (r = −0.303, p < 0.001). Pharmacy students that presented higher rate of emotional problems tend to sleep less and skip breakfast. Conclusions: Female pharmacy students had higher mean scores on all subscales than those found among Romanian women. A strong relationship between dietary habits and eating disorders was identified.