In a new study from the University of Kentucky, researchers found that time-restricted eating may be able to help people with Type 2 diabetes reduce nocturnal hypertension, which is characterized by elevated blood pressure at night.
They found that time-restricted eating, a routine in which eating is restricted to a specific window of time during each day, helped prevent and improve diabetes-related high blood pressure at night.
The finding suggests that in addition to lifestyle changes like diet and exercise, time-restricted eating could have a healthy impact on people with Type 2 diabetes.
Normally, blood pressure falls at night and increases upon awakening, in line with the body’s circadian rhythm. In some hypertensive patients, the typical nighttime decrease does not occur.
This “nondipping” blood pressure is prevalent in patients with Type 2 diabetes and is associated with increased events of heart disease.
The study found that imposing time-restricted feeding prevented diabetic mice from developing nondipping blood pressure.
The practice also effectively restored the disrupted blood pressure circadian rhythm in mice that already had nondipping blood pressure.
In the study, researchers restricted the mice’s access to food to eight hours during their typical active awake times every day.
When food availability was increased to 12 hours, the practice was still effective in preventing and treating nondipping blood pressure.
The team says this is evidence that the effects were caused by the timing of feeding and not calorie restriction.
In addition to the study’s significance for future clinical research in people, they say it’s adding to scientists’ understanding of the causes and mechanisms of nondipping blood pressure in diabetes, which is currently not fully understood.
This is the first basic science research focused on how it impacts nondipping blood pressure related to diabetes and it reveals that the daily timing of food intake could play a critical role.
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The study is published in PNAS. One author of the study is Ming Gong, Ph.D., M.D.
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