Many individuals imagine that standing is more healthy than sitting on the subject of stationary time, however latest analysis challenges this assumption. This new examine reveals that each extended sitting and standing could enhance dangers to coronary heart and circulatory well being. Utilizing exercise knowledge from a big pattern of UK adults, researchers present new insights into how lengthy durations of each sitting and standing can influence cardiovascular and circulatory circumstances. Lead researcher Matthew Ahmadi, together with colleagues from the College of Sydney and Amsterdam UMC, investigated how these widespread postures have an effect on the danger of main coronary heart and circulatory points. The examine’s findings have been lately printed within the Worldwide Journal of Epidemiology.
Consultants assessed the individuals’ habits utilizing wrist-worn units that measured how a lot time they spent sitting, standing, and general stationary time every day. Outcomes confirmed a transparent enhance in each coronary heart and circulatory dangers when folks spent extreme hours sitting. Frequent circulatory points, resembling poor blood circulation and vein issues, have been extra possible amongst those that remained stationary for a lot of the day, whether or not they have been sitting or standing. Whereas standing didn’t seem to extend coronary heart dangers, it did contribute to circulatory points, elevating questions on suggestions to switch sitting with standing.
“Switching from sitting to standing alone is probably not sufficient to scale back main coronary heart dangers,” Dr. Ahmadi defined, emphasizing the totally different well being results linked to every posture. “In actual fact, standing for lengthy durations day by day was immediately related to larger charges of circulatory illness.” Dr. Ahmadi and his staff examined knowledge from the UK Biobank, a significant well being database, learning the stationary habits of adults of their later years over a span of almost seven years. Throughout this era, they recorded hundreds of instances of each coronary heart illness and circulatory circumstances.
Analysis confirmed that the extra folks sat every day past a sure threshold, the extra their threat of circulatory points rose. Likewise, sitting for prolonged durations day by day was linked to a gradual enhance in coronary heart illness. Standing was not linked to coronary heart threat, however when people spent a lot of their day standing, their threat of circulatory issues went up. The findings clearly confirmed that being stationary for lengthy durations, moderately than motion itself, was what contributed to those elevated well being dangers.
Findings from this examine recommend that simply swapping sitting with standing is probably not an efficient resolution for bettering coronary heart and circulation well being. The researchers famous that inactivity can result in poor blood circulation and diminished muscle exercise, elevating the danger of blood pooling in veins, which is a standard explanation for circulatory points. Their work underscores the necessity to incorporate gentle actions like strolling into day by day routines to counteract the dangerous well being results related to sitting or standing for lengthy stretches.
Consultants finally encourage a steadiness of exercise in day by day life, with their findings indicating that each extreme sitting and standing carry distinctive dangers. Well being methods could have to focus much less on standing as an alternative to sitting and extra on integrating gentle motion all through the day. The examine means that reasonable, frequent exercise could be a more practical method for lowering the dangers that include extended stationary habits.
Journal Reference
Ahmadi MN, Coenen P, Straker L, and Stamatakis E. “System-measured stationary behaviour and cardiovascular and orthostatic circulatory illness incidence.” Worldwide Journal of Epidemiology, 2024. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyae136
In regards to the Creator
Dr. Matthew N. Ahmadi is a number one researcher affiliated with the Mackenzie Wearables Analysis Hub on the Charles Perkins Centre and the Faculty of Well being Sciences on the College of Sydney, Australia. His analysis focuses on wearable know-how, notably in assessing bodily behaviors resembling sitting, standing, and bodily exercise, and their influence on long-term well being dangers, together with cardiovascular and circulatory illnesses. Dr. Ahmadi’s latest work makes use of superior knowledge evaluation to grasp how these day by day behaviors have an effect on dangers for circumstances like coronary heart illness and orthostatic circulatory issues, with an emphasis on offering proof for public well being tips.
