Scary health article is scary.

[Salamok]

Not sure how valid this may be, maybe Nebu can chime in...  All I can say is that in the last 10 years my hours spent in an inactive state have skyrocketed and over the last 5 years I feel like I have aged 20 years.  This could just be that the transition from 35 to 40 is dramatic but when I think of my father during his entire 40's I remember him being very active and full of energy, this is not how I feel at all.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/14/phys-ed-the-men-who-stare-at-screens/

Men who spent more than 23 hours a week watching TV and sitting in their cars (as passengers or as drivers) had a 64 percent greater chance of dying from heart disease than those who sat for 11 hours a week or less. What was unexpected was that many of the men who sat long hours and developed heart problems also exercised. Quite a few of them said they did so regularly and led active lifestyles. The men worked out, then sat in cars and in front of televisions for hours, and their risk of heart disease soared, despite the exercise. Their workouts did not counteract the ill effects of sitting.

I wonder what happens when 23 hours a week becomes the 75+ hours a week many of us spend in front of a computer, driving and/or watching TV.

I've been thinking of giving the palates ball as an office chair a try for some time now and this article was the feather that tipped the scale between thinking about it and doing it.  The article seems to indicate that a small yet constant bump in activity (MET's) during those long periods of inactivity might make a difference, hopefully the ball will do just that.  I'm also considering building a laptop dock into my recumbent exercise bike at home and making that my primary home workstation.

I tried to take a look at the list of activities and their calculated MET value but all I get from the link they provided is an intro paragraph and I can't figure out how to get beyond that:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10993420

[Prospero]

A couple of the developers at my office have switched to standing workspaces. They seem to really like them. I just take a lot of walks during the work day. I always think better while moving.

[Selby]

This is why I always insist on walking out to wherever I need to go on the machine at work and hauling my own tools.  That's 2/3-1.5 miles of walking I wouldn't have otherwise.  All the other engineers and techs complain about it and insist on getting in an electric vehicle and driving out there.  I don't know whether it's helping me or not, but I enjoy it.

[ghost]

It's pretty clear that cardiovascular health is improved by vigorous exercise.  The thing that I think has been greatly discounted in all this research is how the effects that a diet full of processed foods, pesticides, antibiotics, high fructose corn syrup, shitty hydrogenated oils and gods know what else has synergised with a sedentary lifestyle.  We eat more crap, as a society, than I think most people expect.

[Merusk]

A couple of the developers at my office have switched to standing workspaces.

I've mused about doing this for a few years now.  When I started school drafting tables and barstools were still standard Arch office features, so you could stand and work at times, instead of sitting in a chair all day.  I know I felt a lot better after several hours working when able to alternate between standing, sitting and half sitting on those stools than I ever have after only a few hours in a task chair.  Now, if only I wasn't a cubicle monkey so I could implement this.

[K9]

Ok, I read the paper, a few points:

 - This is based on a mail-out survey done in 1982. Mail-out surveys are one of the weakest types of evidence as they are quite prone to multiple biases
 - The method they use to determine physical activity is qualitative, and aggregates everyone into one of two broad classes. This is based on a self-reported assessment of physical activity, which may not be consistent or accurate
 - The comparison method they use in their first results table is frankly odd, they compare all the people who died of CVD to everyone else, whether on not they had died.
 - The study only assessed driving and TV watching time, and there ~23% of the study participants spent 23 hours or more combined on the two activities.
 - For people with BMI <25 or those who classed themselves as 'physically active' there was no significant variation in the risk of CVD associated with the combined time spent watching TV and driving.

Results further showed that, regardless of time spent in riding in a car or in combined sedentary behavior, being older, having normal weight, being normotensive, and being physically active were associated with a lower risk of CVD mortality in this  cohort.

 - The only time they mention exercise failing to offset a sedentary lifestyle is late in their discussion, primarily in reference to another paper.

Recent
findings suggest that physiologic mechanisms associated with excessive sedentary behavior are different than the physiologic benefits of regular exercise (18). This may help to partially explain the elevated risk of CVD mortality noted in physically active men who also demonstrated high levels of total sedentary behavior in the current study

 - The section in bold is not supported by the results they present. It is frustrating because this assertion conflicts with comments they make prior in the discussion.

In addition, other evidence indicates that higher levels of aerobic fitness, a strong indicator of a person’s recent level of physical activity, are protective against all-cause and CVD mortality in men in the presence of overweight and obesity (37), type 2 diabetes (10,11), and hypertension (12). One other study of sedentary behavior determined that physically active men and women had lower rates of CVD mortality in the presence of elevated time spent sitting (27). The current study’s findings add to the cumulative evidence for the benefits of being physically active despite the presence of other potentially health-diminishing behaviors and conditions.

Conclusion: being overwheight, inactive and having hypertension, particularly if you are young, leads to an increased lifetime risk of CVD. Being physically active, of a healthy weight helps to protect against CVD.

Shocker.

[Arnold]

A couple of the developers at my office have switched to standing workspaces. They seem to really like them. I just take a lot of walks during the work day. I always think better while moving.

Back when I was a desk jockey I started getting lower back pains while sitting all day.  I contacted our ergonomics consultant and asked if there was anyway I could have a stand-up work station.  They measured me and it was installed a few days later.

I loved that setup.  I would sit for computer work, but I would do everything else standing and my pain went away.

[Prospero]

I've mused about doing this for a few years now.  When I started school drafting tables and barstools were still standard Arch office features, so you could stand and work at times, instead of sitting in a chair all day.  I know I felt a lot better after several hours working when able to alternate between standing, sitting and half sitting on those stools than I ever have after only a few hours in a task chair.  Now, if only I wasn't a cubicle monkey so I could implement this.

I miss my old drafting desk too. I've looked at getting one at home for computing just for the reasons you describe. It's nice to have options.

[pxib]

Ok, I read the paper, a few points:
[quotes and enlightened commentary]

Indeed. Additionally, as they always say, correlation is not causation. There are all sorts of related activities this survey doesn't touch. Men who spend a lot of time in their cars, for example, tend to be heavy commuters: a high-stress acivity, even as a passenger. Alternately, men who spend less time driving and watching TV have more time to spend interacting with their families and friends, lowering stress. Moar longitudinal studies, plz. This short term pop-quiz stuff is bunko.