Daily Health News Blog

CAN YOU SNOOZE AND LOSE? Can getting too little sleep make you fat? Or undermine your weight-loss efforts? On the flip side, can adequate sleep help keep you svelte? It may sound farfetched, but several studies in recent years have suggested such a connection.  A large study from Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research, in the  International Journal of Obesity , found that dieters were most successful when they got just the right amount of sleep (six to eight hours a night). Having lower stress levels helped, too. In another study, in the  Annals of Internal Medicine , overweight people on calorie-restricted diets lost more body fat and retained more lean tissue (muscle) when they slept about eight hours versus five hours a night. Other studies have linked decreased sleep to greater calorie intake and increased abdominal fat. One proposed mechanism is that not getting enough sleep affects appetite hormones, notably ghrelin and leptin, leading to increased hunger and food