Brief communication: Sleep curtailment in healthy young men is associated with decreased leptin levels, elevated ghrelin levels, and increased hunger and appetite

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Ghrelin, published as a randomized controlled trial.

The study included only 12 young men and did not measure energy expenditure.

Who Took Part

The study group was 12 men.

PubMed indexes the participants as adults, men only.

12 healthy men (mean age [+/-SD], 22 +/- 2 years; mean body mass index [+/-SD], 23.6 +/- 2.0 kg/m2).

Daytime profiles of plasma leptin and ghrelin levels and subjective ratings of hunger and appetite.

How the Study Was Run

The researchers set it up as a randomized and crossover study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Ghrelin and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

In the crossover set-up each of the men took both Ghrelin and the comparison in turn, acting as their own control.

Randomized, 2-period, 2-condition crossover clinical study.

Clinical Research Center, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois.

2 days of sleep restriction and 2 days of sleep extension under controlled conditions of caloric intake and physical activity.

What Was Measured

The study included only 12 young men and did not measure energy expenditure.

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Appetite, Energy Metabolism, Ghrelin, Hunger, Leptin, Peptide Hormones and Sleep Deprivation.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized and crossover study of Ghrelin in 12 men.

With fewer than 40 people, it is a small study, so it is better read as an early signal for further research than as a settled answer.

Results are reported in around 2 sentences of the abstract; we leave them to the paper itself rather than summarise them.

The publication is from 2004 (Annals of internal medicine), a journal based in United States.

More context: the Ghrelin compound page, all human trials.