RESCHEDULING THE KEY: New study suggests that skipping breakfast is the key to weight loss.

It might be regarded as the most important meal of the day, but skipping breakfast is the best way to tackle the epidemic of obesity and fatty liver disease, new research suggests.

The study, conducted by Monash University in Australia, concluded that watching the clock rather than counting kilojoules was key to weight loss.

Thirty-two patients who suffered from non-alcoholic fatty liver disease fasted and took in no kilojoules between 8pm and noon the following day.

All patients lost weight over the initial 12-week period, while patients who fasted also reduced their waist circumference, which, according to experts, is one of the ways to measure a decrease in liver damage.

The study also found there was no difference in kilojoule intake, activity levels, hunger levels or quality of life experienced between the two groups.

Melbourne gastroenterologist Alex Hodge, who worked on the study, said similar research had been done on animals before, but these new results indicated there was hope to tackle Australia and New Zealand's obesity problem.

"Experimental studies have shown that restricting access to food, without calorie restriction, prevented animals developing conditions such as fatty liver disease," Dr Hodge said.

"Despite the small numbers of participants in this novel study, there was a significant health benefit from intermittent fasting. When the standard care group was changed to intermittent fasting for an additional 12 weeks, they continued to show improvements."

Those who fasted also recorded improvements in visceral fat, insulin resistance, blood pressure and other measures of liver damage.

Meanwhile, senior nutritionist at Nutrition Australia Aloysa Hourigan said weight loss was only one component of health and certain nutrients might be neglected during long periods of fasting.

"If you're eating less in total, you might be also be getting less nutrients," Hourigan said. "You might lose weight, but that's not the only important thing to health.

"Something breakfast contributes is milk, so you're more likely to get dairy out of it, so you would wonder when people aren't having breakfast, does their dairy intake go down?

"There's some evidence around that actually eating breakfast improves work and learning performance. While the study might be looking at weight, we mustn't forget all the cognitive things that might be affected as well."



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