Dr's Casebook: Start the day off with a healthy breakfast

Dr Keith Souter writes: ​Skimping on breakfast or missing it out is not a good idea, because you are not allowing the body to operate properly. Indeed, it has been found that the rate of obesity, high blood pressure and insulin resistance is up to 50 per cent lower in those who have breakfast compared to those who miss it. Those who miss breakfast also seem more likely to have problems with their cholesterol.

It is thought that breakfast stimulates your natural insulin and primes the body’s metabolism to control blood sugar levels, which are of course, related to how hungry or energetic one feels. By not having that stimulation, the body could ultimately develop some resistance to the insulin, which is where metabolic problems start.

One study from the University of Nottingham asked ten young women to spend two weeks on each of two diet plans. On one diet they had bran flakes with low fat milk for breakfast, then had two meals and two snacks throughout the rest of the day. On the other plan they missed breakfast, but had the cereal at noon, followed by their two meals and two snacks later on.

At the end of the two week period the women’s metabolic responses were checked. In the breakfast skippers, the cholesterol levels were higher and they had poorer insulin sensitivity, than were shown by the breakfast eaters.

It has also been found that when people skip breakfast they actually tend to eat later in the day. The implication being that when you miss breakfast you are more likely to over-indulge the food craving later.

But please note that all the above research has been done on healthy breakfasting, using a wholegrain cereal for breakfast, rather than the full English breakfast. I think its OK now and then, but a wholegrain cereal is a better habit to get into. The research suggests that it reduces the risk of developing insulin resistance by 15 per cent.