|
||||||||||||||||||
Study Reveals the Importance of Breakfast for Heart Health
For years nutritionists, and our loving mothers, have told us that breakfast is the most important meal of the day even though there was no substantiating proof. But, a recent study completed in England at the University of Nottingham revealed that missing breakfast raises the body’s cholesterol and reduces its ability to respond to insulin.
People Continue to
Skip Breakfast
Regular monitoring of people’s eating habits over the years has reveals
that for lot of people breakfast may be just a passing thought as they
rush to get ready for work or school and head out the door, eating later
in the day, usually something not quite so healthy like coffee, sugar-laden
juice, and snacks. Statical analysis also reveals that this trend for
missing breakfast will continue to rise,
Skipping Breakfast
Increases Risk of Weight-Gain
In the study mentioned above, the researchers noted that women who did
not eat breakfast had a tendency to eat more, increasing their daily
overall caloric intake beyond what their body’s required. Obviously,
if this was done on a long-term basis, the women are putting themselves
are greater risk for gaining weight, which of course would be excess
fat accumulation. And, by the way, while this study is referring mostly
to women, remember men, this information can be applied to you as well.
Four Week Study
1st Two Weeks
To observe what effects missing breakfast would have on a person, ten
healthy women with normal body weight were recruited. They were given
bran flakes with low-fat milk to eat before 8:00 A.M. During the day
they would eat their regular lunch and supper, and allowed two snacks
a day, a cookie between 10:30 A.M. and 11:00 A.M. This regimen continued
for two weeks.
2nd Two Weeks
At the end of the two weeks the same women were then told not to eat
breakfast as they normally did at 8:00 A.M., but were to wait and eat
between 12 noon and 1:30 P.M., including two additional meals and a
cookie between 10:30 A.M. and 11:00 A.M.
Results of Four Week
Study
It was discovered that not eating breakfast in the morning for just
two short weeks increased cholesterol levels, including LDL, (Low Density
Lipoprotein), and lowered insulin sensitivity. It was also noted that
the women had a tendency to eat more, or consume more calories daily,
than when they ate breakfast in the morning.
Skipping Breakfast
Can Produce Serious Consequences
What does higher cholesterol, LDL, and reduced insulin sensitivity mean?
It means that the person is increasing the risk of heart disease. This
is because as the amount of LDL increases your body is actually delivering
more cholesterol to the blood stream instead of it being removed when
you have more HDL (High Density Lipoprotein). Also, poor insulin sensitivity
will not allow your body to process blood sugar properly, contributing
to plaque buildup in the arteries. With more cholesterol in the bloodstream
becoming oxidized, and decreased blood-sugar control, contributing to
plaque, or narrowing of the arteries, there will be decreased oxygen
flow to the heart. Eventually there may be a serious enough blockage
that you will have a heart attack, which is the number one killer of
women and men in the United States.
Also, the consuming of more calories than what our body requires which results in weight gain from excess fat accumulation, will increase the stress to the joints contributing to osteoarthritis, free radical damage at the cellular level and inflammation, increasing the pain of arthritis and risks of heart attack and strokes from damaged blood vessels. And, there will be unneeded stress put on our heart, as it struggles to pump blood through miles of blood vessels in the extra, and totally unnecessary, fat tissue, wearing out the muscles of the heart.
