The IAA One Minute Blog

A short stroll every half hour may help undo the health harms associated with prolonged periods of sitting, a new study finds.

Take Five Minutes

In the new study, volunteers who got up and walked for five minutes every half hour had lower blood sugar and blood pressure than those who sat continuously. The researchers also found that walking for one minute every hour helped with blood pressure, but not blood sugar, according to the study.

Mounting evidence has suggested that sitting for a long period of time is hazardous to a person’s health. To look at the best way to combat the effects of sitting, the research team evaluated four different “activity snacks” in 11 volunteers: one minute of walking after every 30 minutes of sitting, five minutes after 30 minutes of sitting and five minutes after 60 minutes of sitting. The effects of each of those strategies were compared to those with sitting with no breaks.

Each of the 11 adult volunteers came to the researchers’ lab where they were seated for eight hours, getting up only for bathroom breaks and whatever activity snack they were told to perform. All 11 ran through each of the strategies one at a time, as well as an eight-hour period in which they only got up for bathroom breaks.

Blood pressure and blood sugar were measured during each phase of the study. The strategy that worked best was five minutes of walking for every 30 minutes of sitting. This strategy also had a dramatic effect on how volunteers’ bodies responded to large meals, producing a 58 percent reduction in blood pressure spikes compared to sitting all day.

All walking strategies resulted in a significant reduction of four to five blood pressure points, compared to sitting all eight hours. Every type of “snack” except for walking one minute every hour, also led to significant decreases in fatigue and improvements in mood.

The study was published in “Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise.”  

Stay Healthy at Work

Eight hours in a chair in front of a computer, five days a week can take a toll on your body. Stay healthy and in shape at work:

1. Avoid the snacks your co-workers place in front of their desks.
2. Drink an adequate amount of water. Eight to 10 glasses every day can help keep you hydrated.
3. Take a walk during lunch.
4. Eat a healthy lunch--it is an important part of a balanced diet.
5. Tension neck syndrome (TNS)can occur when the neck and upper shoulders are held in a fixed, awkward position for extended periods of time, according to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. It can happen to people in the workplace who talk on the phone for most of the day or type a lot. Try using a speakerphone, a shoulder cradle or a headset at work when on the phone.
6. Eyestrain is another problem that can be encountered in front of a computer. It can cause headaches, difficulty focusing, and increased sensitivity to light. To help prevent this, the distance to the screen from your eyes should be about an arm’s length away.
7. Your keyboard, mouse and phone can harbor thousands of germs that can make you sick. So, get out the disinfectant.

It is also important to use those vacation days! They will help you to recharge and be ready to give your job 100 percent.

What IAA has to Say

Insurance Administrator of America wants you to have a healthy work experience. IAA is here to remind you that it is important to get up and move!