In a study published by Nature, it was detailed that The timing of breakfast and dinner has an impact on health. Medical research suggests that late eating the first or last meal of the day is associated with an increased risk of developing cardiovascular disease.
The study carried out in Europe, in which the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), the French Institute for Agronomic Research (INRAE), the French Institute for Health and Medical Research (INSERM) and the Sorbonne University of Parishas revealed that there is evidence that recommends that a longer overnight fast is associated with a lower risk of suffering from certain cerebrovascular diseases.
The results of the investigative work, which has followed up more of 100,000 people over 13 years (between 2009 and 2022), have been published on the Nature Communications magazine portal. “These findings suggest that, beyond the nutritional quality of the diet itself, recommendations related to meal times can help promote better cardiovascular health,” the specialists noted.
“The results of our study show that having late eating habits, having a first meal later than 9 in the morning or having dinner later than 9 at night can be related to a greater risk of developing diseases.” cardiovascular diseases, especially among women,” said Dr. Anna Palomarresearcher at ISGlobal.
The scientist and first author of the study also highlighted: “The work, which needs to be replicated in other studies, supports the importance of adopting earlier eating patterns, coupling them with a prolonged overnight fast with an early last meal instead of skipping breakfast”.
To reach these conclusions, the researchers analyzed data from 103,389 participants in the French cohort NutriNet-Santé (79 percent of whom were women, with an average age of 42 years) and studied the associations between food intake patterns and cardiovascular diseases. To reduce the risk of possible bias, they took into account a large number of factors, especially socio-demographic (age, sex and family situation), nutritional quality of the diet, lifestyle and sleep cycle.
In the statistics, researchers found a 6 percent increase in risk for each hour of delay. Thus, a person who eats for the first time at 9 in the morning is 6 percent more likely to develop cardiovascular disease than someone who eats an hour earlier. As for the last meal of the day, Eating dinner late (after 9 p.m.) is associated with a 28 percent increase in the risk of cerebrovascular diseasessuch as stroke, compared to having dinner an hour earlier, especially in women.
“The time at which we eat plays an important role in our metabolism, since it has an influence on our body’s internal clock,” said Palomar and concluded: “Eating late at night can interrupt this clock, which It can lead to cardio-metabolic problems such as weight gain, disruptions in lipid metabolism, and increased inflammation. Likewise, eating during the body’s rest phase, when levels of the sleep hormone or melatonin are high, could lead to glucose intolerance and higher blood sugar levels. Some studies show that delaying the first meal of the day or eating late at night is related to a increased body weight and liver fat”.