Part of the distress in living with anorexia nervosa may be explained by unhelpful assumptions and maladaptive responses to the illness. Training parents in skills to manage the illness may improve outcome by reducing interpersonal maintaining factors.

The transfer of specialist skills within the programme was highly valued by the carers and lessened their stress and care giving difficulties.

Preliminary findings suggest that workshop-based intervention with two families might be as effective as an individually focused family intervention. This may offer a more cost-effective intervention for this treatment-resistant group.

Fifty-five percent of the caregivers have high EE. High-EE relatives noted a higher caregiving burden than low-EE relatives particularly on the 'dimension of loss'. The level of EE was reduced following a skills training program.