Association of sleep with visceral fat in young adolescents of Gujarati Ethnicity

Abstract

Background and Aim: Habitual short sleep duration is a common practice linked to weight gain and risk of obesity. The objective of the study was to find out the association between sleep and visceral fat in young adolescents of Gujarati ethnicity. Methods: We used cross-sectional, experimental study data from students of Gujarati ethnicity from different parts of Gujarat in the same institution ( n = 608). We assessed the association between sleep duration ( 7.5 h) and visceral obesity (visceral fat 0–9 as normal and 9 and above as visceral obese). Young healthy adolescents of Gujarati ethnicity were enrolled in the study and divided as per the areas of Gujarat. We measured visceral fat using the body composition monitor of Omron. We measured sleep by asking them the number of hours they sleep in 24 h. Data were analyzed using SPSS software. An explorative, descriptive analysis was done; univariate analysis and logistic regression were also performed. Results: Univariate analysis showed that there was a negative correlation seen with Visceral fat (-0.038), Systolic pressure (-0.044) and Diastolic pressure (-0.075); while negative correlation with sleep was seen in only female population; even though the results were not statistically significant. We found the sleep in hours in our population to be a higher mean of 7.3 h in males, while it was found to be 7.1 h in females. The range of sleep was 6 h– 9 h as the 5 th and 95 th percentile and 7 h as the 50 th percentile in both males and females. Conclusion: The sleep is associated negatively with visceral fat in the female population. Hence, adequacy of sleep for >7.5 h, a potentially modifiable behavior to prevent obesity needs to be considered. Detailed longitudinal studies tracking other activities that contribute to obesity also need to be done.