Fatty diets lead to daytime sleepiness, poor sleep 
 
 Wednesday, 20 April 2016 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 University of Adelaide researchers have found that men who consume diets high in fat are more likely to feel sleepy during the day, to report sleep problems at night, and are also more likely to suffer from sleep apnoea. 
 
 
 
 This is the result of the Men Androgen Inflammation Lifestyle Environment and Stress (MAILES) study looking at the association between fatty diets and sleep, conducted by the University of Adelaide's Population Research and Outcome Studies unit in the School of Medicine and the Freemasons Foundation Centre for Men's Health. 
 
 
 
 The results – based on data of more than 1800 Australian men aged 35-80, including their dietary habits over a 12-month period – have been published this month in the journal Nutrients. 
 
 
 
 "After adjusting for other demographic and lifestyle factors, and chronic diseases, we found that those who consumed the highest fat intake were more likely to experience excessive daytime sleepiness," says study author and University of Adelaide PhD student Yingting Cao, who is also based at SAHMRI (South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute). 
 
 
 
 "This has significant implications for alertness and concentration, which would be of particular concern to workers," Ms Cao says. "High fat intake was also strongly associated with sleep apnoea." 
 
 
 
 In total, among those with available dietary and sleep data, 41% of the men surveyed had reported experiencing daytime sleepiness, while 47% of them had poor sleep quality at night. 
 
 
 
 About 54% had mild-to-moderate sleep apnoea, and 25% had moderate-to-severe sleep apnoea, which was assessed by a sleep study among those who did not have a previous diagnosis of sleep apnoea. 
 
 
 
 "Poor sleep and feeling sleepy during the day means you have less energy, but this in turn is known to increase people's cravings for high-fat, high-carbohydrate foods, which is then associated with poor sleep outcomes. So the poor diet-and-sleep pattern can become a vicious cycle," Ms Cao says. 
 
 
 
 "The simple message is a commonsense one, but we need more people to pay attention to it: we need to eat better; a good sleep the night before is best." 
 
 
 
 Ms Cao says quality of sleep is often not taken into consideration in studies investigating the effects of varying diets on weight loss. 
 
 
 
 "We hope our work could help to inform future intervention studies, enabling people to achieve healthy weight loss while also improving their quality of sleep," she says. 
 
 
 
 This study has been funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and the ResMed Foundation. 
 
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 Abstract 
 
 macronutrient intake has been found to affect sleep parameters including obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) in experimental studies, but there is uncertainty at the population level in adults.cross-sectional analysis was conducted of participants in the Men Androgen Inflammation Lifestyle Environment and Stress cohort (= 784, age 35–80 years). Dietary intake was measured by a validated food frequency questionnaire. Self-reported poor sleep quality and daytime sleepiness were measured by questionnaires. Overnight in-home polysomnography (PSG) was conducted among participants with without previously diagnosed OSA.after adjusting for demographic, lifestyle factors, and chronic diseases, the highest quartile of fat intake was positively associated with excessive daytime sleepiness (relative risk ratio (RRR) = 1.78, 95% CI 1.10, 2.89) and apnoea-hypopnoea index (AHI) ≥20, (RRR = 2.98, 95% CI 1.20–7.38). Body mass index mediated the association between fat intake and AHI (30%), but not daytime sleepiness. There were no associations between other intake of macronutrient and sleep outcomes.high fat is associated with daytime sleepiness and AHI. Sleep outcomes are generally not assessed in studies investigating the effects of varying macronutrient diets on weight loss. The current result highlights the potential public health significance of doing so. View Full-Text
– If fat is satisfying, there is a price to be paid—and not just in one's weight. Australian researchers are reporting in the journal Nutrients that a diet high in fat appears to increase daytime sleepiness, as well as poorer sleep quality at night. After electronically monitoring 1,800 men between the ages of 35 and 80 for obstructive sleep apnea and reviewing sleep and food questionnaires, University of Adelaide researchers found that even after adjusting for several factors known to affect sleep—including depression, medications, alcohol, smoking, physical activity, and waistline—the men in the top quarter of fat intake were 78% more likely to report daytime sleepiness and nearly three times as likely to have apnea compared to men in the bottom quarter. "Poor sleep and feeling sleepy during the day means you have less energy, but this in turn is known to increase people's cravings for high-fat, high-carbohydrate foods, which is then associated with poor sleep outcomes," says study author Yingting Cao. "The poor diet-and-sleep pattern can become a vicious cycle." She goes on to tell the New York Times that the timing of the meal itself could be a mechanism, but the team didn't ask for that information. The researchers do not report whether they distinguished between types of fat—i.e. lots of bacon and burgers versus salmon and avocado—and did not study the impact on women, but they did find that the link between one's fat intake and sleep apnea was strongest in participants with the highest body mass. (American waistlines have expanded dramatically in the past decade.)