Eating only during daytime may prevent heart problems due to night shift, finds study

While shift work is a known risk factor for cardiovascular events a new study on Tuesday showed that eating only during the daytime may prevent the risksSleep timing has been a major area of focus but researchers from Mass General Brigham US and the University of Southampton UK stated that food timing could be a bigger risk factor when it comes to cardiovascular healthPrevious studies have shown that working the night shift is associated with serious health risks including to the heart due to circadian misalignment the mistiming of our behavioural cycle relative to our internal body clockThe researchers found that cardiovascular risk factors including autonomic nervous system markers plasminogen activator inhibitor1 which increases the risk of blood clots and blood pressure increased after night workHowever the risk factors stayed the same in the participants who only ate during the daytimeldquoAvoiding or limiting eating during nighttime hours may benefit night workers those who experience insomnia or sleepwake disorders individuals with variable sleepwake cycles and people who travel frequently across time zonesrdquo said the team in the paper published in the journal Nature CommunicationsThe study included 20 healthy young participants For two weeks they had no access to windows watches or electronics that would clue their body clocks into the timeThe participants followed a constant routine protocol a controlled laboratory setup that can tease apart the effects of circadian rhythms from those of the environment and behaviours for example sleepwake lightdark patternsDuring this protocol the participants stayed awake for 32 hours in a dimly lit environment maintaining constant body posture and eating identical snacks every hourAfter that they participated in simulated night work and were assigned to either eat during the nighttime as most night workers do or only during the daytimeImportantly both groups had an identical schedule of naps and thus any differences between the groups were not due to differences in sleep scheduleOur study controlled for every factor that you could imagine that could affect the results so we can say that its the food timing effect that is driving these changes in the cardiovascular risk factors said lead author Sarah Chellappa an associate professor at the University of SouthamptonWhile further research is necessary to show the longterm health effects of daytime versus nighttime eating the team said the results are promising and suggest that people could improve their health by adjusting food timingThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoeveratOptionskeyd0ddb8ef8f1a62a8cdd22fac27fc5ea7formatiframeheight90width728params