Inadequate sleep may be a factor in child obesity
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Not getting enough shut-eye each night may play a role in youngsters becoming overweight, partly by disrupting normal metabolism, a doctor from the University of Bristol, UK, contends in a report released today.
Although there is a “strong genetic contribution to obesity,” the current epidemic of obesity has been driven largely by environmental factors—an unhealthy diet and a lack of physical activity—Dr. Shahrad Taheri points out in the Archives of Disease in Childhood.
Moreover, there is an emerging body of research that suggests that sleep may impact energy balance and that short sleep duration may lead to metabolic changes that could help fuel the development of obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Laboratory studies hint that as little as two to three nights of too little sleep in young adults can have profound negative effects on fat hormones.
In one study, for example, the hormone ghrelin, which is released by the stomach to signal hunger, was nearly 15 percent higher in people sleeping only five hours per night versus the generally recommended eight hours.
Inadequate sleep disturbs other hormones as well, including insulin, the stress hormone cortisol, and growth hormone, which could boost the desire for fatty foods.
Short sleep duration affects not only energy intake, but energy expenditure as well, since it results in tiredness that may curb physical activity levels.
Links between sleep deprivation and obesity seem to be particularly robust in children, Taheri notes, “in whom there is a linear dose-response relationship between shorter sleep and increased body weight.”
In general, children and adults are sleeping less today than in years past, Taheri also points out, and the decline in nightly hours of shut-eye coincides with the rise in obesity.
Taheri blames diminishing sleep duration on computers, cell phones, TVs and other gadgets—all of which have become readily available to children and are increasingly found in their bedroom. Removing these devices from the bedroom and keeping strict bedtimes are essential to promoting adequate sleep and healthy sleep habits among children and adolescents, Taheri believes.
Getting an adequate amount of sleep each night may not be the only answer to skyrocketing rates of overweight and obesity among today’s youth, “but its effect should be taken seriously,” Taheri writes.
Good sleep, coupled with a healthy diet and plenty of physical activity, “could be part of the obesity prevention approach,” Taheri concludes.
SOURCE: Archives of Disease in Childhood, November 2006.
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