|
Night Eating Syndrome Leads to Obesity
A
condition that causes people to wake up several times a night
and eat may put them on a path toward obesity, a new study suggests.
U.S. researchers found that normal-weight
people with the condition, known as night eating syndrome (NES),
resembled obese people with NES in their eating habits and other
behaviors -- except that people with NES who were obese were almost
9 years older than non-obese night eaters.
Furthermore, many obese night eaters
reported that they believed their tendency to snack at night preceded
their weight gain, the authors note.
These findings suggest that NES
is more than just an inconvenience that interferes with getting
a good night's sleep, study author Dr. Albert Stunkard of the
University of Pennsylvania told Reuters Health.
"After night eating for a few years,
you become obese," he said.
Stunkard explained that people
with NES typically wake up between 1 and 4 times each night, and
snack on about 300 calories worth of food. Many people with NES
are sleep-deprived as a result, or feel frustrated that they cannot
control their cravings, he said.
He added that people with NES are
typically fully conscious of their eating habits. In contrast,
people with another type of night eating problem will snack while
sleepwalking, and are often unaware of their behavior.
Approximately 1.5 percent of the
population has NES, but the condition has been found in up to
15 percent of people who are obese.
As part of their report in the
International Journal of Eating Disorders, Stunkard and his team
asked 40 non-obese and 61 obese people with NES to answer questions
about their eating habits.
The researchers found that both
groups shared many of the same eating and sleeping habits. For
instance, both had an equal amount of trouble sleeping, the same
morning appetites, and felt the same level of control over night
eating.
However, non-obese night eaters
were almost 9 years younger than obese night eaters, and tended
to have NES for between 3 and 7 years less than obese night eaters
-- suggesting that the condition leads to weight gain after a
while.
SOURCE: International Journal of
Eating Disorders, March 2004.
Reference
Source 89
For more information on how to prevent other diseases, use
PreventDisease.com's "Quick
Prevention Resources".
|
