Eating at the wrong time increases the risk of diabetes

When it comes to losing weight, three factors have always counted: Calories, food composition and exercise. Now a fourth has been added: the right time. If you eat the wrong thing at the wrong time, you disrupt the rhythm in which our metabolism works best.

No carbohydrates in the evening
This was shown in an experiment with 29 men on a diet. Although around a third of them did not yet have diabetes, their sugar metabolism was no longer functioning as it should.

If these men ate mainly carbohydrates from the afternoon onwards, this pushed their blood sugar levels even higher. If, on the other hand, they ate carbohydrates mainly in the first half of the day, this had a positive effect on their blood sugar.

In particular those people with an already disturbed sugar metabolism should follow their internal clock and avoid carbohydrate-rich meals in the evening, advises study author Natalia Rudovich, who works as a diabetologist at Hospital STS AG in Thun.

Biorhythm is central
Doctors are increasingly recognising how important the internal clock is for our health. Every organ and practically all cells follow a rhythm that is dictated by the alternation of day and night. This rhythm is controlled by a central region in the brain. If we eat and fast alternately day and night, this central internal clock and the clocks in the body’s cells tick to the same beat.

However, a number of disruptive factors cause the various clocks in our bodies to start ticking differently: We sit in artificial light for hours in the evening, work late into the night, constantly stare at screens that emit light of the same wavelength as the sun, eat at almost any time and sleep too little – all of which disrupts our internal clocks.

Fatal consequences
The consequences: We have more appetite, put on weight, our blood sugar rises and with it the risk of diabetes. However, disregarding circadian rhythms is harmful in other ways too. It also favours heart attacks and certain cancers and nerve diseases.

"Our metabolism is subject to circadian rhythms to a certain extent. Sugar metabolism, for example, is reduced at night. The various hormones are also not equally active at all times of the day," explains Stéphanie Hochstrasser, Head of nutrinfo at the Swiss Society for Nutrition. However, it is not the case that the metabolism works completely differently at night than during the day. "In principle, a cheese roll can also be digested at night."

The American Heart Association (AHA) has recently advised people not to skip breakfast, as this also has a negative effect on the sugar metabolism.

But what should you do if you were born an "owl" and have no appetite in the morning? "The nutritional recommendations are basically the same for 'owls' and 'larks'," says Hochstrasser. However, you have to adapt them individually. "While a lark might want to have breakfast at eight o'clock in the morning, an owl might wait until ten o'clock and then treat itself to a slightly larger snack. That’s ok."