As people get older, their eating habits often change—not just in what they eat, but also in when they eat.
While we’ve long known that nutrition plays a big role in healthy aging, new research suggests that the timing of meals—especially breakfast—may be just as important.
Researchers from Mass General Brigham and other institutions have discovered that older adults tend to gradually shift their mealtimes as they age.
Their study, published in Communications Medicine, also found that changes in meal timing may be connected to serious health risks, including a higher chance of dying earlier.
The study was led by Dr. Hassan Dashti, a nutrition expert and circadian biologist at Massachusetts General Hospital. He and his team looked at more than 20 years of data from nearly 3,000 adults in the UK aged between 42 and 94.
They focused on when people ate meals, how those times changed over the years, and whether the changes were linked to any health problems or death.
They found that as people aged, they tended to eat both breakfast and dinner later than they used to.
At the same time, the total number of hours during which they ate each day got shorter. For example, someone might have gone from eating between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. to eating only between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m.
One of the most important findings was that people who ate breakfast later in the day were more likely to have health problems such as depression, low energy, poor sleep, and trouble with cooking meals. Those with oral health issues or other physical challenges were also more likely to delay breakfast.
Even more concerning, people who regularly ate breakfast later were found to have a higher risk of death during the study period. The researchers also discovered that people who are naturally more active at night—so-called “night owls”—were more likely to have these later eating patterns.
Dr. Dashti said that changes in meal timing could be used as an early warning sign. If an older person suddenly starts eating much later than usual, it could be a signal that something else is going wrong, either physically or mentally. That’s why tracking mealtimes might be a simple but powerful way to keep an eye on overall health in older adults.
These results also have important meaning for people who are trying diets like intermittent fasting or time-restricted eating. While these diets may be helpful for younger people, they might not have the same benefits—or could even be harmful—for older adults if they lead to skipping or delaying meals like breakfast.
The research team suggests that encouraging consistent mealtime routines, especially for breakfast, could become part of new strategies for promoting healthy aging and longer life.
In short, the old advice that “breakfast is the most important meal of the day” may be especially true for seniors. Paying attention to when meals are eaten could make a real difference in how we age.
The study is published in Communications Medicine.
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