News :
Desk job study finds fitness guidelines fall short
ABC Online - Australia, July 20 2005 -- Men who work desk
jobs may have to do more physical exercise than that spelled out in
Australia's physical activity guidelines to stay healthy.
The guidelines recommend adults do at least 30 minutes
of physical activity at least five days a week.
But a team from Central Queensland University has pointed
to a conundrum, finding that may not be enough if for men who sit behind
a desk for most of the day.
The authors of the study, led by Kerry Mummery, spoke to
1,579 Australian men and women in full-time jobs.
"[In] the results for occupational sitting time for
men, there was a very strong association between increased sitting time
and increased likelihood of being overweight and obese," Professor
Mummery said.
"For women, the women who sat for longer - an hour-and-a-half
up to six hours - there was an increased association but it wasn't significant."
Inadequate
Professor Mummery says that among men, performing the national
recommended level of exercise was not enough to overcome the effects
of sitting at a desk all day.
"Even if you were physically active 30 minutes a day,
our national guidelines ... a minimum of five days a week, you still
were 90 per cent more likely to be obese if you sat at work for six
hours a day, compared to those people who only sat for less than 45
minutes a day," he said.
"So really what that's saying is that national physical
activity guidelines of 30 minutes a day may not be sufficient in terms
of protecting a portion of our population - those people who are quite
sedentary in work - from increased levels of overweight and obesity."
But Adrian Bauman, the director of the New South Wales
Centre for Physical Activity and Health, says the recommendations remain
"the best guidelines we can develop for overall health".
"Considering that half of adult Australians are not
even meeting 30 minutes a day, we've got a long way to go to get those
people up to move half an hour a day," Professor Bauman said.
"If we do we'll have the maximum health benefit in
terms of reducing their risk of heart disease, of diabetes, reducing
their blood pressure.
"That's why we use those recommendations."
Incidental exercise
The study found that the average sitting time at work was
about three hours a day. However, a quarter of the men and women surveyed
revealed they were sedentary on the job for more than six hours a day.
Professor Mummery offered some speculation as to why the
amount of time spent at a desk was not as big a factor for women as
for men.
"Women may get more incidental activity through housework
and other activities than men, who may not," he said, noting: "I
know my wife agrees with this - in my case anyway."
Professor Bauman recommends workers put more "incidental"
physical activities into their job.
"Even if you run for half an hour a day you are still
an absolute couch potato in terms of obesity prevention," he said.
"So how can we move more? At work we can use the stairs
to get up to the floor that we work on. We can catch the bus to work
instead of driving and walk those 15 minutes to and from the bus at
each end of our trip.
"We can factor in actually walking outside to
get our sandwich at lunchtime rather than having it delivered. That's
a new urban form in Sydney where everything comes to your desk and you
don't need to move."
(source : www.abc.net.au)
