If you’re not getting enough sleep it just might be the reason your waistline is getting bigger, according to a new study that links a lack of sleep with obesity.
Stanford University School of Medicine researchers said sleep loss leads to higher production of
If you’re not getting enough sleep it just might be the reason your waistline is getting bigger, according to a new study that links a lack of sleep with obesity.
Stanford University School of Medicine researchers said sleep loss leads to higher production of a hormone that triggers appetite, while at the some time suppressing levels of a hormone that tells your body it’s full.
For their study, researchers looked at sleep pattern data of 1,024 volunteers from a Wisconsin Sleep Cohort Study. The researchers found a 14.9 percent increase in ghrelin and a 15.5 percent decrease in leptin in people who regularly slept for five hours compared with those who slept for eight.
“Our results demonstrate an important relationship between sleep and metabolic hormones,” wrote the researchers.
They also found a proportional relationship between people sleeping less than eight hours, and increased body mass index (BMI).
“Individuals who spent less than 8 hours sleeping were shown to have a greater likelihood of being heavier. Good sleep, in combination with other lifestyle modifications may be important in fighting obesity,” researchers conclude.
(Leptin suppresses appetite, while Ghrelin increases the feeling of hunger)