Kate Tchanturia

Professor Kate Tchanturia (born 1960) is a Professor of Psychology in Eating Disorders at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London. She is also the (Lead) Consultant Psychologist at the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust for the National Eating Disorder Service London, United Kingdom. Her main research interests include cultural differences in illness presentations, cognitive profiles in eating disorders, and experimental work in emotion processing and translational research from experimental findings to real clinical practice [1].She has supervised over 30 Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) and Clinical Psychology students in the field of cognitive neuroscience and trained a generation of cognitive neuroscientists in the eating disorder field across the globe and has dozens of clinical researchers, Master of Science (MSc) students and leads multiple clinical teams to translate research evidence into clinical practice. Professor Tchanturia is passionate about clinical service innovations to improve healthcare for patients. She also has a particular interest in women’s mental health and has pioneered the novel pathway for the autism spectrum condition (ASC) and eating disorder comorbidity[2][3].

Professor Kate Tchanturia, 2013

Education

Professor Tchanturia began her academic career at Tbilisi State University, Georgia (country) in 1977, gaining her BSc in General and Experimental Psychology in 1982 and her doctorate in Experimental Psychology (PhD) in 1988. She relocated to London, United Kingdom in 1997 and was accredited as a chartered clinical psychologist (2001) and later awarded fellowship of the British Psychological Society in 2014[1].

Career and research

Academic career

Professor Tchanturia became an Associate Professor at Tbilisi State University in 1995. After relocating to London in 1997, she became a clinical research fellow at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London in 1998. She was later appointed a Lecturer in Mental Health Studies and Eating Disorders at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience in 2004. Professor Tchanturia’s research primarily concerns the cognitive and socio-emotional aspects of eating disorders, implementing positive psychology in clinical practice. She has adapted a cognitive training programme for eating disorders, called Cognitive Remediation Therapy, which seeks to address inflexible and overly detail-focused cognitive styles in patients with eating disorders. Her latest research investigates the nature of autistic traits in patients with eating disorders[1]. She has developed a novel clinical pathway for patients with comorbid autism spectrum disorders and eating disorders at the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust National Eating Disorders Service [3]. Her clinical manuals in Emotion training and perfectionism are used across the age spectrum. Clinical protocols and inpatient group programmes developed by Professor Tchanturia and her research and clinical teams are translated in many languages. She taught in many European countries, USA, Australia, Japan, South America and New Zealand. She serves as an associate editor in European Eating Disorder Review. Professor Tchanturia is also a fellow of the British Psychological Society, Fellow of Academy of Eating Disorders and Higher Education Academy.

She is a member of many professional organisations including EDRS, HPCP, BABCP.

Clinical career

Professor Tchanturia worked as a clinical psychologist at Tbilisi City Psychiatric Hospital from 1982-1985. She was then appointed to the role of Consultant Clinical Psychologist for the Outpatient Department of the Institute of Psychiatry in Tbilisi.

After relocating to the United Kingdom, Professor Tchanturia worked as a Clinical Research Fellow at Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London from 1998-2003. She subsequently continued her work as a locum psychologist and later Consultant (lead) Clinical Psychologist for the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust from and is currently employed in this role.

Pathway for Eating Disorders and Autism

Professor Tchanturia’s research paved the way for the extensive research at the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust eating disorders service. Research from her lab identified an overlap between ASC and eating disorders and found that approximately 35% of women with anorexia nervosa have comorbid ASC however, females are at elevated risk of their ASC going undiagnosed as their difficulties are frequently mislabelled or missed entirely. Therefore, women in eating disorder services who have comorbid ASC often go undiagnosed and fail to receive appropriate treatment [1].

In response, Professor Tchanturia and colleagues have developed and implemented a novel clinical pathway tailored to the needs of ASC patients with eating disorders: The PEACE Pathway (Pathway for Eating disorders and Autism developed from Clinical Experience). This clinical pathway was funded by The Health Foundation and further supported by The Maudsley Charity. The novel pathway was developed using the Institute for Healthcare’s Model of Improvement methodology, using an iterative Plan, Do, Study, Act (PDSA) format to introduce change and to co-produce the work with their main stakeholders; people with lived experience, carers and with clinicians [1].

Based on findings from their qualitative studies that mapped out the needs for the three stakeholders, Professor Tchanturia and colleagues collaboratively engaged people with lived experience, carers, and clinicians from the National Eating Disorder Service to develop the PEACE clinical pathway. The PEACE acronym stands for "Pathway for Eating disorders and Autism developed from Clinical Experience". This name was chosen by patients as part of the patient and public involvement (PPI) activities. They followed the needs assessment map and put in place: 1) an eating disorder service team with training in autism spectrum condition considerations; 2) tailoring and adapting the treatment pathway; and 3) evaluation of changes in clinical practice using qualitative and quantitative methods [1].

Preliminary outcomes from the pathway indicated promising findings and positive feedback from all three of the main stakeholders. Patients with the comorbidity have reported improvements in their experiences of care due to the implemented adaptations.

In the current economic context, it is critical to ensure that eating disorder treatments are both effective and cost-effective. A health economics evaluation suggested that the pathway led to reduced lengths of admission for patients with the comorbidity, with an estimated cost saving of £275,000 per year for the inpatient eating disorder service alone [1].

Another big milestone in the project was to design and evaluate short pragmatic diagnostic tools to identify sensory sensitivities amongst the patient group and format groups adapted to patients’ needs [1].

As the Principal Investigator of the PEACE Pathway, Professor Tchanturia has been disseminating her findings through several means, including a book, peer-reviewed publications, social media platforms, conferences around the world, interviews with the media and a website. The website includes a range of free resources and blog posts for all three of the main stakeholders. It also includes a carers forum [3].

Other positions held

Professor Tchanturia holds the following positions:

  • Fellow of the British Psychological Society
  • Fellow of the Academy of Eating Disorders
  • Associate Editor of the European Eating Disorders Review
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
  • She is an invited reviewer for many peer-reviewed scientific journals
  • She is an external examiner for dissertations in the UK and for other international universities

Publications

Books

Professor Tchanturia has written several textbooks relating to eating disorders treatment, including: Brief Group Psychotherapy for Eating Disorders, Ed Tchanturia K (2015) Routledge[4] and Cognitive Remediation Therapy (CRT) for Eating and Weight Disorders, Ed Tchanturia K (2015) Routledge[5]. Her latest book titled Supporting Autistic People with Eating Disorders: A Guide to Adapting Treatment and Supporting Recovery will be out in March 2021 and published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers[6][7].

She has also written clinical manuals of Cognitive Remediation Therapy for adults and adolescents and a self-help guide for use with carers, emotion skills training, wellbeing workshops, perfectionism groups and other clinical protocols.

Journal articles

Professor Tchanturia is the author of over 200 peer-reviewed journal articles. Her H index in 2020 is 54 and her work has accrued over 9,800 citations, 25 papers cited more than 100 times[1].

Honours and awards

In 2018, Professor Tchanturia received the Normann Munn Distinguished Visiting Scholar Award, which sponsored research at Flinders University in Adelaide, South Australia. She was also the recipient of the Service User Award for Best Psychological Service in the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust in 2015 and the recipient of an NHS Innovator Prize in 2007[1]. In 2020, Professor Tchanturia was awarded the Leadership Award in Research by the Academy of Eating Disorders[8].

Professor Tchanturia has received several teaching awards during her time at King’s College London, including Best Contribution to Postgraduate Student Experience in 2012 and 2019, a Teaching and Supervisory Excellence Award in 2014, and an Excellence in Teaching Award in 2009[9]. . She is the recipient of research funding from The Royal Society, The Wellcome Trust, Medical Research Council, The Health Foundation, The Maudsley Charity, Psychiatry Research Trust, Swiss Anorexia Foundation, and NHS Innovation[1].

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References
  1. "Kate Tchanturia – Research Portal, King's College, London". Kclpure.kcl.ac.uk.
  2. "Clinical packages & Protocols". katetchanturia.com.
  3. "PEACE Pathway Website". peacepathway.org.
  4. Tchanturia, Kate, (2015). Brief group psychotherapy for eating disorders : inpatient protocols (1 ed.). Hove, East Sussex: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-138-84888-7.
  5. Tchanturia, Kate, (2015). Cognitive remediation therapy (CRT) for eating and weight disorders (1 ed.). Hove, East Sussex: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-138-79402-3.
  6. Eating Disorders Research Group
  7. SLaM National Services
  8. "Academy for Eating Disorders". www.aedweb.org.
  9. "Kate Tchanturia - Prizes - Research Portal, King's College, London". kclpure.kcl.ac.uk.


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