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More sleep led to lower BMI in adolescents
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Adolescents aged 14 to 18 years who get more sleep are more likely to have nonuniform changes in BMI distribution, new research suggests.
“Increasing sleep among adolescents, especially those in the upper half of the BMI distribution, may help prevent overweight and obesity,” Jonathan A. Mitchell, PhD, department of biostatistics and epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania, and colleagues said.
The aim of the study, which included 1,390 adolescents entering ninth grade, was to determine whether sleep duration is associated with BMI distribution changes. Follow-up was conducted every 6 months until the participants graduated from 12th grade. Researchers used quantile regression to model the 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th and 90th BMI percentiles.
Researchers found that BMI increased as participants aged, with the greatest increase in the 90th BMI percentile.
They also found that every additional hour of sleep caused decreases in BMI at the 10th (HR=–0.04; 95% CI, –0.11 to 0.03), 25th (HR=–0.12; 95% CI, –0.20 to –0.04), 50th (HR=–0.15; 95% CI, –0.24 to –0.06), 75th (HR=–0.25, 95% CI, –0.38 to –0.12) and 90th (HR=–0.27; 95% CI, –0.45 to –0.09) BMI percentiles. Researchers added that increasing sleep from 7.5 to 10 hours per day at age 18 years could equal a reduction in the proportion of adolescents with a BMI >25 by 4%.
“Shorter sleep was associated with increases in BMI from age 14 to 18, especially at the upper tail of the BMI distribution,” Mitchell and colleagues wrote.
Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.
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