Gaining Just 5kg In Weight May Raise Your Risk Of Serious Diseases

Gaining Just 5kg In Weight May Raise Your Risk Of Serious Diseases - Most adults gain weight as they age, but adding as little as five kilograms by middle age may substantially raise the risk of major illnesses, researchers said recently.

Harvard University scientists found that even modest weight gain in adulthood “was associated with a significantly elevated incidence of a composite measure of major chronic diseases, consisting of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and nontraumatic death,” said the report in the Journal Of The American Medical Association.

“Our study is the first of its kind to systematically examine the association of weight gain from early to middle adulthood with major health risks later in life,” said senior author Frank Hu, professor of nutrition and epidemiology at Harvard University.

“The findings indicate that even a modest amount of weight gain may have important health consequences.”

The study was based on survey data from more than 92,000 people, tracked from 1976 until 2012.

Participants self-reported their estimated gains, beginning from age 18 in women and age 21 in men, through 55, an age researchers described as “middle adulthood.”

Most people gained weight over that span.

Women added an average of 10kg and men about 8.6kg.

Health problems rise 

Compared to people who maintained their weight within five pounds (2.26kg) of their young adult selves, those who bulked up faced significant increases in health problems, from heart disease to unhealthy ageing, said the report.

“Each five-kilogram weight gain was associated with a 30 per cent increased risk of type 2 diabetes,” it said.

Other risks included a 14 per cent increased risk of high blood pressure and eight percent increased risk of cardiovascular disease.

Gainers also saw a six percent increased risk of obesity-related cancer.

Those who had never smoked saw a five per cent increased risk of dying prematurely.

Overall, each 5kg weight gain was linked to a 17 percent lower chance of achieving healthy ageing.

“Higher amounts of weight gain were associated with greater risk of chronic diseases,” added the report.

Researchers said they hope their findings help doctors and patients better understand the health consequences of gaining weight over time.

Heart failure

Another US research has found that small weight gains is also enough to affect the structure and function of heart muscle.

This potentially increasing the long-term risk of heart failure.

A team from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, US, followed 1,262 adults with an average age of 44 for a period of seven years.

All participants were free from heart disease and other conditions that put them at high risk for heart disease.

MRIs scans of participants’ hearts and various body fat measurements were taken both at the start of the study and again seven years later.

The researchers found those who gained as little as 5 per cent during the seven years were more likely to have thickening and enlargement of the left ventricle – a well-established indicator of future heart failure.

Signs of heart problems

Those who gained weight were also more likely to show subtle decreases in their hearts’ pumping ability and were more likely to show changes in heart muscle appearance and function, even after the researchers eliminated other factors that could affect heart muscle performance and appearance, including high blood pressure, diabetes, smoking and alcohol consumption.

However, those who shed pounds were more likely to show decreases in heart muscle thickness.

The authors noted that how much a person weighed at the beginning of the study did have any impact on the heart’s changes, suggesting that even those of normal weight could still be at risk of adverse heart effects if they gain it over time.

As a preventative strategy 

Although the team cautioned that their study was relatively small and the results do not mean that every person who gains weight will go on to develop heart failure, the study’s senior author, Ian Neeland, M.D., still advised weight loss as an important preventative strategy against changes.

If weight loss cannot be achieved, then individuals should focus on weight stability as another preventative measure.