When Taylor Ford joined the University of Iowa Scanlan Center for School Mental Health more than four years ago, she came in with the hope of continuing her work addressing the needs of people experiencing eating disorders.
Now, around one year since the clinic and resource center started offering eating disorder services to Iowa school districts and their families, Ford says interest is only growing.
“There’s such a lack of access to specialized eating disorder treatment in Iowa that we know that there’s a need,” Ford said. “And so with limited access to outpatient providers and then lack of access to the higher levels of care for eating disorders, we are trying to be proactive in getting people treatments so that hopefully they don’t have to go to those higher levels of care.”