Are there any other treatments for avoidant restrictive food intake disorder?

The Feeling and Body Investigators (FBI) approach is a novel management strategy for ARFID that is designed for children aged 4 to 10 years old. This method appears to be particularly suitable for children who are hypersensitive to food or who associate food with negative emotions and/or negative body sensations. The FBI approach uses games and various cartoon characters to enhance children's self-awareness. It aims to teach children to not immediately reject uncomfortable body sensations (such as fast breathing or hunger) or unpleasant feelings triggered by external stimuli (such as olfactory stimuli). Instead, it encourages children to “investigate” these sensations through play, eventually helping them perceive them as interesting.^[1][2] Although this approach is a step forward in the management of ARFID, larger studies are required to prove the effectiveness of this method.

Another method that is already in use for eating disorders and is being explored for ARFID is called food chaining. This method aims to introduce new foods into the diets of individuals with ARFID by associating the characteristics of foods that they consider safe to eat with those of other foods that should be introduced or that the individual wants to be able to eat. Food chaining is a gradual process, and foods are introduced one at a time or a few at a time.^[2] Future research should focus on examining the effectiveness of this method specifically for ARFID patients.