The weekend eating habit that could silently be raising your risk of heart disease – and why timing meals is crucial

Eating at a different time on weekends from weekdays could increase the risk of heart disease, according to a new study.

People whose mealtimes shift between weekdays and weekends – a phenomenon called ‘eating jetlag’ – may face a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, especially men, researchers found.

The study followed more than 100,000 participants in the French NutriNet-Sante cohort with an average age of 42 for eight years.

Participants were segmented by their eating schedule. One group ate earlier at the weekend than in the week, a second maintained similar schedules throughout and a third ate later at the weekend.

Compared with participants with consistent eating patterns, men in both the earlier and later meal-timing groups had a higher risk of cardiovascular disease or coronary heart disease, with the strongest associations in those who ate earlier at weekends.

Each hour of difference in timing between weekday and weekend meals was associated with a 14 per cent higher risk of cardiovascular disease and a 21 per cent higher risk of coronary heart disease in men. But no significant association was observed in women and no link was found with strokes.

People whose mealtimes shift between weekdays and weekends – a phenomenon called ‘eating jetlag’ – may face a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, especially men, a study found

One reason may be that men generally have a higher risk of cardiovascular disease. The authors also suggested that differences in lifestyle, work patterns and biological factors between men and women could help explain the findings.

The researchers wrote in the Communications Medicine journal: ‘These findings suggest that discrepancies in mealtimes between weekdays and weekends may play a role in the onset of cardiovascular disease. Our findings support the importance of considering meal timing regularity, in addition to meal timing itself, in relation to cardiovascular health.’

In the UK, cardiovascular disease, including heart disease and stroke, accounts for 170,000 deaths a year – a quarter of all deaths. Smoking, poor diet, excess weight and inactivity are among the major factors raising the risk of cardiovascular disease.