Did you know that you can actually lose weight by sleeping more, and gain more weight by sleeping less? It may seem reasonable that you might lose weight by sleeping more because if you sleep long enough you might manage to miss a meal, and if you are sleep deprived you would gain more weight because you have more opportunities to eat. While superficially this might appear to make sense, there’s much more to it than that.
It has been found that chronic sleep deprivation, averaging less than 5 hours a day, resulted in metabolic and endocrine changes similar to those found in the aging population. Ailments such as hypertension, obesity, diabetes, increased in severity, while the secretion of thyroid-stimulating hormone decreased, and cortisol secretion increased.
The changes that researchers, Karine Spiegel and Rachael Leproult, particularly noted were those connected to glucose metabolism. Glucose tolerance alterations in healthy sleep deprived subjects were found to be similar to patients with type-2 diabetes.
Research by Emmanuel Mignot MD. PHD showed a strong association between sleep deprivation and disruption to metabolic hormones. The hormones of interest in this study were ghrelin and leptin, ghrelin mostly produced by the stomach stimulates appetite, leptin produced by the body’s fat cells decreases appetite and regulates metabolism.Mignot et al found that subjects who averaged 5 hours sleep showed increased ghrelin secretion, and decreased leptin secretion compared to those subjects who slept for 8 hours.
What has been noted by other researchers, Van Cauter and colleagues, was the difference in the ratio between ghrelin and leptin for subjects who averaged 4 hours sleep. It was found that the ratio of ghrelin to leptin increased by 71 percent in these subjects compared to those who slept for 10 hours. What was even more noticeable was that food preferences were for simple carbohydrates, cookies, cakes and candy, whereas more nutritious foods were not as appealing.
While researchers have established a correlation between sleep deprivation and obesity, it remains just that, for perhaps many other factors have a role in the increase of obesity in today’s society.
Recommended sleep disorder sites
sleep deprivation and weight gain
sleep deprivation and weight gain
Sleep Disorders
Sleep Disorders
Sleep Net
