Could Morning Fasting Help Lose Weight?

Many people are firmly convinced that they just need a few cups of coffee to start the day properly, working until lunch in fasting catabolic conditions. Others argue that they need breakfast to be highly efficient.

- 

It is a long-standing debate: whether or not the morning energy intake influences energy balance and health. Several prospective cohort and cross-sectional studies have indicated a correlation between morning fasting and negative health outcome, but the causal connection remains unclear.

Recently, scientists of the Bath Breakfast Project published interesting new findings in the well-respected American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. They performed a randomised control trial with repeated measures and follow-ups in obese people in South-West England.

The test persons were separated randomly into a fasting group (no intake until noon) and a group with daily breakfast intake (>700 kcal before 11 am). Both were observed for a six-week period and effects on health and energy balance were measured under free-living conditions.

In the beginning of the study the anthropometric baseline characteristics of the probands were determined. These include height, fat mass index, waist circumference, body mass and the individual resting metabolic rate which was detected by means of indirect calorimetry. This technique calculates heat at resting conditions by measuring the production of carbon dioxide and the consumption of inhaled oxygen.

Furthermore, blood samples were taken after overnight fasting and analysed for key systematic metabolites like cardiovascular health markers (concentration of HDL/LDL cholesterol, triacylglycerides, glucose), markers of the immune system (C-reactive protein, interleukin-6) and regulatory hormones of the thyroid gland and the pancreas (T3 and T4, insulin, glucagon).

Complete Monitoring