Weird Fatty Liver and sleep connection discovered

NAFLD is all about eating healthy and losing weight, right?

Wrong! Says a new study in Frontiers in Network Physiology.

It’s your sleep that caused NAFLD – and it’s your sleep that can correct it.

But not the amount of sleep.

NAFLD, often called the liver’s response to metabolic syndrome, results from fat buildup in the liver due to disruptions in metabolism.

While researchers already knew circadian rhythms (your body’s internal clock) impact metabolism, this study explored how poor sleep affects humans with NAFLD.

Researchers tracked the sleep of 35 NAFLD patients and compared it to 16 healthy individuals.

Instead of relying on self-reported sleep quality (which is often inaccurate), participants wore actigraph devices for four weeks.

These devices tracked their movements, providing detailed sleep data.

Here’s what they found:

• More Nighttime Awakenings: NAFLD patients woke up an average of 8.5 times per night, compared to 5.5 times for healthy individuals.

• Increased Awake Time: They spent 45.4 minutes awake after initially falling asleep, compared to 21.3 minutes for healthy peers.

• Lower Sleep Efficiency: NAFLD patients spent 86.5% of their time in bed asleep, while healthy individuals reached 92.8%.

• Shorter Sleep Duration: On average, NAFLD patients slept for six hours compared to six hours and 45 minutes in healthy individuals.

• Delayed Sleep Onset: They reported taking longer to fall asleep.

Even after a session of sleep hygiene education, the NAFLD group’s sleep patterns remained fragmented.

Animal studies have shown that disrupted circadian rhythms can lead to overeating, insulin resistance, inflammation, and metabolic dysfunction — all contributors to NAFLD. This study suggests similar processes occur in humans, highlighting the importance of sleep quality in managing liver health.

So to avoid NAFLD, it’s essential to get better sleep.

If you already have NAFLD, sleeping better is not enough. You also have to make a few simple diet and lifestyle changes to clear your liver of all excess fat…