Researchers conducted a study to see if there is a link between working in a traditional office environment and an increased risk of heart failure. Following 82,000 men, ages 45 to 69, over 10 years led to the conclusion that men who don’t exercise regularly and whose jobs require them to sit for five or more hours per day are twice as likely to develop heart failure than their more active counterparts.

What is heart failure?

Heart failure occurs when your heart muscle is no longer able to efficiently and effectively pump blood through your body. Unlike an acute attack, which causes the heart to stop beating, heart failure is a drawn-out process whose victims experience continually diminished quality of life over an extended period of time.

What does my job have to do with it?

Most Americans are stuck behind a desk for upwards of 9 hours each day. This sedentary behavior puts you at risk of developing serious medical conditions like high blood pressure, decreased circulation, and obesity; all factors directly linked to heart failure.

Avoid becoming a statistic

To avoid becoming a statistic, researchers recommend standing at least 10 minutes every hour. The easiest way to accomplish this without interrupting your workday is with a standing desk by Xdesk. With the click of a button, you can transform your traditional seated desk into a standing model. Conversely, when you’ve fulfilled your standing goal, you can easily convert back to a seated arrangement with the click of a button.

In addition to incorporating the practice of standing while working into your daily routine, be sure to build active time into your schedule as well. Simple actions like taking time to stretch at your desk or going for a stroll around your corporate campus can make a tremendous difference in your overall health and wellbeing. Take getting moving a step further by scheduling walk and talk meetings instead of flopping down in chairs in your favorite meeting room.

While our culture is one that revolves around seated tasks, it’s your responsibility to challenge those norms. Standing at least 10 minutes every hour and consciously adding more activity to your workday can significantly reduce your risk of heart failure. If you’re struggling finding additional ways to increase your activity level at work, Rutgers University has some great tips to keep you active and reduce your risk of heart failure.

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The Open Office
An open office plan has become more favorable than closed-in cubicles or separate offices. You’ve enjoyed the camaraderie and team-building, but it can have negative effects in the long run. Open offices encourage high noise levels and privacy is eliminated, which can result in stress and reduced work satisfaction. The Journal of Applied Psychology published a study that showed this office safety hazard in action. Forty clerical workers were exposed to low-intensity noise, while another group experienced silence. Both groups were given unsolvable math problems. The group exposed to noise gave up after a few tries, while the group working in silence continued to try and solve it. If you’re bothered by office noise, you can wear ear buds or headphones.

The Office Coffee Pot
Sad to say, but the communal coffee pot harbors bacteria and viruses, and is the most likely place to find norovirus. Norovirus is highly contagious, and can cause vomiting and diarrhea. To combat the issue, it’s important to observe proper hand-washing and hygiene. If you or your coworker has been sick, don’t prepare the coffee that morning until all symptoms are gone. And of course, clean the coffee pot every night before leaving the office.

The Air Flow (Or Lack Thereof)
You could be allergic to work! Not the practice, but the actual building. Closed offices can keep in allergens and other substances that can cause symptoms like sneezing, wheezing and trouble breathing. If you notice the symptoms lessen after work, during a weekend or while on vacation, the office air could be the culprit. Paints, adhesives, and even your desk could be causing an allergic reaction. Thankfully Xdesk are made from all natural materials like bamboo and aluminum, so common additives like particleboard and formaldehyde aren’t used. These office safety hazards can be treated if you make an appointment with an allergist.

The Rising Temperatures
Ever notice how hard it is to concentrate if it’s too hot? A warm environment can decrease productivity in the form of drowsiness, restlessness and a drop in decision-making ability. If your office isn’t up for blasting cold air, bring in a few fans and wear light clothing to increase the air flow around you. This is even more important if you own a treadmill desk, since constant walking elevates your body temperature.

The Desk Chair
There have been countless studies showing the negative physical and mental effects of sitting all day. Remaining in one place has detrimental effects on productivity, and leads to major health problems like obesity and cardiovascular disease. This can easily be avoided with a standing desk, or by making a point to keep moving throughout the day.

Have you experienced any of these office safety hazards? How have you avoided them?

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The study was published in the journal Circulation: Heart Failure. Researchers discovered that men who sat for five hours a day at minimum (outside of work), and didn’t exercise regularly were twice as likely to experience heart failure than men who were physically active and sat for less than two hours a day.

Based on statistics from the American Heart Association, 1 in 5 Americans ages 40 or older will develop heart failure at some point during their lifetime. Heart failure occurs when the heart cannot support proper blood flow.

The researchers studied health records of more than 82,000 male participants ages 45 to 69 over 10 years. The subjects recorded the amount of prolonged sitting they experienced outside of work as well as their physical activity level. The study included men of all shapes, sizes and races.

After the end of the study, researches came to the conclusion that men who were not physically active were 52 percent more likely to develop heart failure than their more active counterparts.

“The results of this large study of a racially and ethnically diverse population reinforce the importance of a physically active, and importantly, a non-sedentary lifestyle for reducing the risk of heart failure,” Deborah Rohm Young, the study’s head and researcher at the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Department of Research & Evaluation, said. Take it from the lead researcher herself: A non-sedentary lifestyle is essential to reduce the risk of heart failure and poor heart health.

James Levine of the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix gives even more insight to the detriments prolonged sitting has on health. “If you’ve been sitting for an hour, you’ve been sitting too long,” he said. “My gut feeling is you should be up for 10 minutes of every hour.” Although he wasn’t directly involved with this particular study, Levine has made great strides in revealing the harmful effects of sitting.

Of course this isn’t the first study to shed light on the negative health effects of prolonged sitting. If you follow the Xdesk blog, we posted a study from Cornell University that revealed sedentary behavior (as defined as sitting for more than 11 hours a day in this scenario) is directly related to a 12 percent increase in premature mortality in women. To learn more about the health study, click here.

This study was originally reported in the International Business Times. To see the full article, click here.

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The women completed surveys in 2001, 2004, 2007 and 2010 based on sitting time, physical activity and depressive symptoms. The results were studied in 2011 and published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

The researchers looked for an association between all three of the topics surveyed and found that women who sat for more than seven hours a day had a 47 percent higher risk of depression symptoms than women who sat for four hours or less a day.

The study went on to reveal that women who didn’t participate in any physical activity (such as prolonged sitting and no exercise) had a 99 percent higher risk of developing depression symptoms than the women in the study who exercised.

The amount of exercise was based on 30 minutes per day according to guidelines set by the Australian government. Women who sat for long periods of time and didn’t exercise were three times more likely to have depression symptoms than women who sat less and were more physically active.

The study couldn’t pinpoint an exact association of whether depression causes a person to sit more and exercise less, or if sitting too long makes a person depressed. However, the women who sat more were much more likely to feel depressed in the present, but prolonged sitting didn’t predict depression years later.

The researchers concluded that more physical activity could actually alleviate present depressive symptoms and possibly prevent future symptoms later in middle-aged women. And reducing the amount of sitting time daily could relieve current symptoms of depression.

With this information, it just gives even more reason to stand up! Stand, stretch, adjust your desk, and move around to stay mentally alert and upbeat. To learn more, you can read the abstract from the study, HERE.

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The health study went on to reveal that even women who exercised regularly were at risk of early death if they spent most of the day sitting. More than 11 hours of daily sitting or sedentary time led to a 12 percent increase in premature mortality – this may seem like a small amount, but the sedentary group also experienced an increase of cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease and cancer by 13, 27 and 21 percent.

The nutritional scientist who led the health study reported that being physically fit and active every day was not enough to protect women from the negative health effects of sitting.

Sitting for a longer period of time made it harder for women to regain their physical strength. Women started to lose muscle mass at age 35, which led to an earlier onset of menopause. Daily exercise is ideal to keep the risk at bay, but more movement throughout a women’s day is key to maintaining health.

“In general, a use it or lose it philosophy applies,” the nutritional scientist said. “We have a lot of modern conveniences and technologies that, while making us more efficient, also lead to decreased activity and diminished ability to do things. Women need to find ways to remain active.”

Women with desk jobs aren’t getting the amount of movement they need to stay active during the day, but middle aged women and younger should start adopting changes to make a difference.

The scientist recommended getting up and moving around frequently at the office, and to take breaks between computer and reading time. She suggested retired women should find time to move around inside and outside the house.

“Some earlier studies found a more dramatic effect on mortality risk from [sitting] time, and others are similar to our findings,” she said. “Collectively, this adds to the growing body of research linking inactivity to poor health outcomes.”

Beyond linking sitting time with poor health, this is one of the largest and most ethnically diverse health studies of its type. The women ranged in ages of 50 to 79, and were observed for over 12 or more years.

See the full article from the Cornell Chronicle, HERE.

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Sitting for long periods of time negatively effects your physical health.

Okay, by this point we know that using an ergonomic desk is good for your health. And we know that sitting down for long periods of time can be bad for you. But how bad can a little bit of sitting really be?

Turns out, pretty bad…..

• Sitting down all day is as bad as smoking a pack of cigarettes. Of course these are bad for you in two completely different ways, but researchers found that sitting at a desk for 6-8 hours per day is as bad for your health as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day.

• Sitting down all day makes you more likely to have a heart attack. Scientists at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Louisiana analyzed the lifestyles of more than 17,000 men and women over a period of 13 years. At the end of their study, they found that people who sat down for most of the day were 54 percent more likely to die of a heart attack!

• Sitting makes you more likely to get all kinds of diseases. In another study, researchers found that sitting not only increases your chances of contracting weight-related diseases, like diabetes and heart problems—but it also makes you more likely to get cancer. Those who sat and exercised in the study fared a bit better, but even working out regularly was not enough to counteract the hazards of sitting too much. 

• Sitting drops your good cholesterol. After just two hours of sitting down, your body’s production of good cholesterol drops by 20 percent, while the enzymes that break down fat drop by 90 percent– as soon as you sit down!

• Sitting for impacts your metabolic system. “Today, our bodies are breaking down from obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, depression, and the cascade of health ills and everyday malaise that come from what scientists have named, ‘the sitting disease.’” –James Levine, MD, PhD

So what can you do if you have a desk job? Trade your traditional, sitting desk for an ergonomic desk. Offices all over the world, the likes of Google, Men’s Health, and even the FBI are turning to ergonomic desks because standing makes for healthier, happier, and more productive employees. But there are plenty of other benefits to an ergonomic desk or adjustable height desk. Check out our next post about the fun facts on standing.

And check out this nifty tool that will calculate how much of your day you spend sitting. The results might surprise you!

How much of your day do you spend sitting?

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