Ianthe House Recovery Circles — Impact Report
Millions of women face the devastating effects of eating disorders while juggling the pressures of careers, families, and societal expectations. Too often, traditional healthcare systems fail to address their unique needs, leaving them isolated and underserved. The Ianthe House program is designed to bridge this critical gap, providing a community-based, compassionate approach that integrates recovery into the realities of daily life. Our fully remote Recovery Circles give participants tailored tools, emotional support, and practical strategies to reclaim their health and autonomy.
This report highlights the transformative progress achieved by the six women participating in our founding Recovery Circle, demonstrating measurable results and meaningful change.
Program Overview: What Makes Us Different
Our recovery program is meticulously crafted to meet the unique challenges of adult women struggling with eating disorders. By combining evidence-based therapies, lived-experience insights, and flexible, digital interventions, we have created a model designed to facilitate long-term, sustainable eating disorder recovery.
Core Features:
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A close-knit, supportive group of women who connect daily and attend therapy together, sharing empathy, encouragement, and accountability. Enhancing social support seeking—a key predictor of long-term recovery.
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Expert-led sessions that explore the root causes of disordered eating, building resilience, self-awareness and self-compassion through shared growth and relational healing.
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Evidence-based "tapping" techniques that help participants to regulate emotions, manage stress responses, and address limiting beliefs. EFT has been shown to lower cortisol levels, rewire neural pathways, and reduce symptoms of anxiety and emotional eating, making it a powerful tool for lasting recovery.
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Tailored WhatsApp messages providing encouragement, strategies, and accountability to keep participants motivated and focused.
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Tools that empower participants to document their journey, celebrate milestones, and identify growth areas, providing both clarity and measurable insights.
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Our support team provides hands on 1:1 support through regular checkins recovery mentorship, tailored to the level of care you need.
Our accessible approach enables the long-term commitment to treatment needed to embed recovery and avoid relapse, seamlessly fitting into participants’ professional and personal lives. Unlike traditional clinical models, Ianthe House prioritises flexibility, peer-driven accountability, and a holistic integration of tools like EFT and psychodynamic therapy. These elements enable participants to make real, lasting changes.
Results
The outcomes achieved in just six weeks demonstrate the power of our model to deliver impactful, life-changing progress. To measure the effectiveness of our approach, we collected pre-program baseline scores and compared them to six-week midpoint scores across eight key categories. Each category score reflects participants' self-assessments using validated tools, with higher scores indicating greater progress. By analysing these averages, we can illustrate the tangible improvements participants have achieved and how our program aligns with our mission to revolutionise eating disorder recovery.
1. Overall Progress
This score represents the combined improvement across all measured categories, providing a comprehensive view of the participants' progress throughout by consolidating data from key areas such as eating disorder recovery, wellbeing and quality of life, personal growth, and financial health, this metric offers a holistic snapshot of the transformative changes achieved.
Summary of Results:
Collective overall progress increased by 18%.
The best overall progress improvement was an impressive 35%.
2. Eating Disorder Recovery
This section tracks how frequently participants experience thoughts and behaviours related to eating disorders. By understanding these patterns, we can identify the severity of symptoms and provide targeted support. For example, participants reflect on the frequency of preoccupation with food, compensatory behaviours, and body-checking habits. Measuring this is essential to tailor interventions and ensure lasting recovery.
We used the Eating Disorder Questionnaire (EDQ) to measure this category—a widely recognised, validated tool designed to assess eating disorder symptoms comprehensively, offering reliability and comparability across clinical and non-clinical settings.
Summary of Results:
Average Improvement: Collective eating disorder recovery scores increased by 18 percentage points, reflecting substantial progress in this category.
Highlights: One participant achieved a remarkable 36% improvement in this category.
3. Wellbeing and Quality of Life
This examines emotional wellbeing and overall life satisfaction, crucial for sustained recovery. Participants evaluate their feelings of purpose, autonomy, and personal growth, as well as the presence of negative emotions like anxiety or feeling down-hearted. Tracking this shows how recovery enhances not just physical health but overall fulfilment.
To measure wellbeing, we used the DASS-21 (Depression, Anxiety, Stress Scale), a validated instrument known for its sensitivity in capturing changes in emotional states. Quality of life was assessed using the Quality of Life Enjoyment and Satisfaction Questionnaire Short Form (Q-LES-Q-SF), a survey that measures quality of life across various domains, offering reliability and broad applicability.
Summary of Results:
Average Improvement: The group’s wellbeing and quality of life scores increased by 17 percentage points, showcasing significant enhancements in mental health and life satisfaction.
Highlights: The best individual improvement in this category was 42%.
4. Growth
Our Growth category encompasses three vital areas: Social Support Seeking, Active Tackling, and Autonomy & Mastery. These measures reflect participants' progress in building resilience, fostering connections, and reclaiming personal agency. Measuring personal growth is critical as it signals changes in mindset and the ability to maintain recovery in the long-term by creating sustainable habits and relationships.
Summary of Results:
Average Improvement: Participants' growth scores increased by 23 percentage points collectively.
Highlights: The best individual growth improvement was 38%.
Social Support Seeking
This subcategory reflects how often participants reach out for help from friends or family when they’re feeling down or struggling. Seeking support reduces isolation, fosters connection, and provides accountability that strengthens recovery. It represents participants overcoming internalised shame and fear of judgment—critical barriers to recovery.
Summary of Results:
Average Group Improvement: 31 percentage points.
Highlights: The top improvement in this category was 71%.
Active Tackling
This subcategory assesses participants' commitment to engaging in activities that support recovery. Proactively confronting challenges, maintaining progress, and building sustainable habits are central to long-term success. Active tackling predicts participants’ ability to stay engaged beyond the typical relapse window.
Summary of Results:
Average Group Improvement: 19 percentage points.
Highlights: The most outstanding improvement in this category was 29%.
Autonomy & Mastery
This subcategory measures participants’ comfort in expressing their needs, desires, and thoughts, even when it might involve risk or conflict. Building autonomy and mastery reclaims personal power and grows self-confidence, both crucial for a successful recovery. This metric highlights how participants move from passive reacting to more autonomy and authentic expression—both of which are key to long-term happiness.
Summary of Results:
Average Group Improvement: 19 percentage points.
Highlights: The best improvement recorded was 43%.
5. Financial Health
This category focuses on the financial impact of eating disorders, including money spent on associated behaviours and the cost of treatment. Financial health matters because it influences stress levels and affects access to ongoing care and support. By reducing financial strain, participants are better equipped to focus on their recovery.
Summary of Results:
Average Group Improvement: 21%.
Highlights: The most significant improvement in this category was 52%, with a monthly saving of £375.
Testimonials: Voices from the Recovery Circle
Our participants rate the likelihood of recommending our program to other women seeking support for eating disorder recovery at an impressive 8.9 out of 10, reflecting the trust and value they’ve found in our unique approach. The following testimonials offer a glimpse into the personal transformations experienced by our participants, serving as a reminder of the human lives behind the data:
Conclusion
Our pilot program has achieved transformative results in just six weeks, but it is only the start of the journey. To ensure lasting impact, we are committed to collecting longitudinal data and tracking participant progress. By monitoring key metrics over time, we can refine our approach and solidify the gains participants have made.
Our program is designed for long-term engagement of nine months or more, with the pilot covering just one phase of this journey. Continued active tackling beyond nine months, past the critical window for relapse, is a core pillar of our model and a key predictor of long-term recovery. Sustained engagement is vital for embedding recovery habits, building resilience, integrating new behaviours into daily life, and ensuring lasting success.
Your contributions have already empowered our participants to access life-changing tools and experiences, and we are deeply grateful for the support that has made this progress possible. Now, we invite you to take the next step in continuing your support for these incredible women. Subsidising memberships for our low-income participants will enable them to continue their journey, maintain their recovery, and achieve deeper personal growth. This crucial support will remove financial barriers for those who struggle, allowing them to sustain their progress, and ensure that Ianthe House remains both impactful and sustainable, allowing us to reach even more individuals in need. With your help, Ianthe House can become a beacon of hope and transformation, proving that recovery is not just possible but sustainable.
