Consuming breakfast early may enhance longevity

Investigators examined alterations in mealtime schedules among older adults and uncovered gradual transitions as they mature. Additionally, they identified factors that may lead to these mealtime changes and highlighted certain characteristics linked to a higher likelihood of an early demise.

Findings from the Mass General Brigham study have been published in Communications Medicine

“Our findings indicate that variations in meal times for older adults, particularly the breakfast schedule, could act as an easily observable indicator of their overall health condition,” stated lead author Hassan Dashti, a nutrition researcher and circadian biologist at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital as well as an assistant professor of anesthesia at Harvard Medical School.

“Patients and healthcare providers might utilize changes in mealtime habits as an early alert for potential physical and mental health complications. Moreover, advocating for consistent mealtime routines among older adults could be integrated into wider strategies for fostering healthy aging and longevity,” Dashti noted.

Dashti and his team — which includes senior author Altug Didikoglu from the Izmir Institute of Technology in Turkey — investigated crucial factors of mealtime timing that are important for aging demographics to see if certain patterns may indicate, or even affect, health results in later life. The research group assessed data, including blood analyses, from 2,945 non-institutionalized adults in the UK aged 42–94 years, tracked over a span of more than 20 years. They found that as individuals grow older, they commonly have breakfast and dinner at later intervals while also reducing the overall duration available for consuming food each day.

Consistently, later breakfast hours were associated with physical and mental health issues such as depression, fatigue, and dental health concerns. Struggles with meal prep and poorer sleep quality were also linked to delayed dining times. Notably, later breakfast hours correlated with a higher risk of mortality during follow-up examinations. Individuals genetically inclined towards characteristics of being a “night owl” (favoring later sleeping and waking times) tended to have meals at extended times.

“Until now, we lacked comprehensive understanding of how mealtime timing evolves in later stages of life and how this transition is connected to overall health and longevity,” stated Dashti. “Our findings contribute to bridging that gap by illustrating that delayed meal scheduling, especially postponed breakfast, is associated with health complications and increased mortality risk in older adults. These outcomes add a new dimension to the adage that ‘breakfast is the most vital meal of the day,’ particularly for older individuals.”

Dashti emphasized that this has significant ramifications as time-restricted eating and intermittent fasting gain traction, where the health effects of altering mealtime habits may differ greatly in older populations compared to younger adults.

This research was funded by the National Institutes of Health.