London: Do you need to lose weight? Then, turn off the television an hour earlier and go to bed, for a new study has revealed that getting more sleep could help you
shed the flab.
An international team, led by Walter Reed Army Medical Centre in Washington has found that lack of sleep a night can affect a person's hormone levels which may trigger hunger and slow down metabolism and could thereby cause them to eat more, resulting in weight gain.
According to lead researcher Dr Arn Eliasson, BMI (body mass index) of a person is linked to length and quality of sleep in a consistent fashion. Obesity is defined as having a BMI of 30 or more.
Researchers have based their findings on an analysis of the sleep, activity and energy expenditures of 14 nurses who had volunteered for a heart-health programme at the Walter Reed, where they were employed.
They found that the nurses who slept longest were slimmer than those who managed the least shut-eye.
"When we analysed our data by splitting our subjects into 'short sleepers' and 'long sleepers', we found that short sleepers tended to have a higher BMI (28.3) compared to long sleepers, who had an average BMI of 24.5. "Short sleepers also had lower sleep efficiency, experienced as greater difficulty getting to sleep and staying asleep," 'The Daily Telegraph' quoted Dr Eliasson as saying.