A controlled study of phenomenology and family history in outpatients with bulimia nervosa.

We administered structured diagnostic interviews and family history evaluations to 69 outpatient women meeting the new DSM-III-R criteria for bulimia nervosa. This group was compared with 50 women with DSM-III bulimia, 24 women with major depression, and 28 nonpsychiatric control women, all recruited during previous studies. On both phenomenologic and family history assessments, the women with DSM-III-R bulimia nervosa closely resembled the women with DSM-III bulimia, and both groups differed significantly from controls in their prevalence of personal and familial major mood disorders. These data support a relationship between bulimia nervosa and major mood disorders, consistent with that suggested by studies of bulimia assessed by earlier diagnostic criteria.