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Sleep loss could ruin your diet -- it could lead to loss of muscle instead of fat. (Photos.com)
Weight loss and a lack of sleep may be linked together, according to a recent study which found that sleep-deprived people on diets experience less fat loss.
The findings were published on Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine, finding that sleep habits factor into weight regulation. Researchers say that people trying to lose weight should try to get more sleep, otherwise their body will consume muscle over fat.
Ten overweight men and women took part in the study and lived in a sleep lab for two weeks. Both were on the same calorie-restricted diet and slept for 8.5 hours per night for one periods of time and then slept 5.5 hours per night for another period of time.
The patients lost an average of seven pounds for both trials. When the patients were sleep-restricted, they lost lean muscle tissue instead of fat. When they got 8.5 hours of sleep, they lost the same amount but more than half of the weight was fat."So they lost the same amount of weight, but the composition was different," senior researcher Dr. Plamen Penev with the University of Chicago told Reuters.
Penev noted that the findings in a lab setting might be different from results in the real world.
