Most people would agree that nutritional quality is important for health, but what about timing? In particular Time Restricted Eating (TRE) which has been promoted for improving weight loss and metabolic health. Does it work and does it help with weight loss?
Time-restricted eating (TRE) has been promoted for improving metabolic health, including blood sugar and blood pressure , especially for those with metabolic syndrome, by suggesting that eating with our circadian rhythms is healthier. It has been promoted as a weight loss method and to improve longevity. However, a recent study suggests that this may not be accurate.
Many animal studies have shown how fasting through the use of TRE increased longevity. What we don’t know conclusively is – does this work with human beings?
TRE and calorie restriction
New research from Berlin shows that TRE on it’s own, has little benefit, but that it does affect our circadian rhythm.
Researchers took a group of 31 overweight or obese women and had them eat meals that were the same in nutritional and calorie content. One group ate between 8:00-4:00 PM and one group ate between 1:00-9:00 PM for two weeks and then they had the groups switch to the other meal timing. They collected blood samples, the participants wore continuous glucose monitors and physical activity was recorded.
The results were unexpected
They unexpectedly did not find any significant changes to insulin sensitivity, blood lipids or inflammatory markers. All thought to be benefits of TRE.
Prof. Olga Ramich, Head of the Department of Molecular Metabolism and Precision Nutrition at the DIfE and Professor at the Charité — Universitätsmedizin Berlin, says
Our results suggest that the health benefits observed in earlier studies were likely due to unintended calorie reduction, rather than the shortened eating period itself.
Something I have always thought of as a benefit to TRE. There are fewer hours to eat mindlessly. Limiting the time spent eating can result in less snacking, and often those snacks aren’t healthy. The researchers believe that the health benefits of fasting come from the reduced calorie intake, not when you eat.
They did find that changing your eating schedule does effect circadian rhythms with the later eating schedule shifting the participants internal clock by 40 minutes. Similar to light exposure, eating later at night is a cue for a later sleep schedule.
Restricting your calorie intake to eight hours per day can help reduce the number of calories you consume and this has proven health benefits. I would also like to see if the results were the same for fit women and with a larger sample of individuals, but for now, eating less often is best accompanied by eating less.
Change your mind, change your health,
Shayla
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