I am a nurse. I am well aware the benefits of exercise. I am not self employed and unable to schedule my own work day. Most RN's in ambulatory care spend most to their time on the phone sitting, If it is a busy day, there may be no breaks. If I take a break and am one minute late, this needs to be justified to my supervisors. Until this type of work schedule is incorporated into the real world, we will continue to have health problems for all workers.
48
I'm lucky. I don't have to answer to corporate rules that prevent me from my exercise program. I set an alarm. And then I read one long or 2 short chapters while I walk around my living room. The short walks and floor with some give to it save me from the shin splints I get when I walk outside or for long periods of time. My personal rule is that I must be walking if I want to read during the daytime. Since reading has been my passion since I was three or four, it's exactly the right motivation for me. I get to read-YAY!! The exercise is like a bonus for me. I love it and it's the most consistent I've been with moving ever.
13
I really want to know how I can get in on this six-hour workday thing!!
27
Does EVERYTHING have to be so controversial? Come on people, all it's saying is that getting up and walking around a bit more, when or if you can, will be good for you. If your circumstances (or your boss) won't allow this, then you'll have to exercise some other way. Really can't please everybody ...
26
I'm a lifelong multitasker and figured out different ways to keep moving at my desk while still on the clock. i stand up and move around while on calls, during webinars, 'drive bys' when people stop by my desk for info etc. I just get up out of my chair any chance I get. I also bought an inexpensive pair of hand exercisers to keep my hands strong and carpal at bay. i use a fit ball for interactive sitting. My new office mates are following suit...Oh and I stretch and do crunches while watching the tube.
7
I'm a screenwriter. I sit, happily, for many hours a day at my computer. Every day. The idea that I will/can get up and walk for five minutes every hour is ludicrous. First, once I start writing I have no idea how much time has passed. It could be an hour. It could, and often is, six hours.
When I am writing and lost in my work, I have no idea how much time has passed. I am lost in the world I am struggling to create: If it is raining in my story I am always surprised when I look up and realize that outside it's a sunny day. I frequently do not eat or even use the bathroom when I am writing, let alone get up and do walkabout! I'm sure this is the same for many others who work at computers.
And don't tell me to use a timer to alert me when an hour has passed. Tried that. Didn't even hear it go off.
When I am writing and lost in my work, I have no idea how much time has passed. I am lost in the world I am struggling to create: If it is raining in my story I am always surprised when I look up and realize that outside it's a sunny day. I frequently do not eat or even use the bathroom when I am writing, let alone get up and do walkabout! I'm sure this is the same for many others who work at computers.
And don't tell me to use a timer to alert me when an hour has passed. Tried that. Didn't even hear it go off.
14
I believe you, but different strokes for different folks. I'm a 74-year old blindness researcher, doing mostly reading, writing and math while sitting. If I sit more than an hour, my knees ache when I stand up, but the pain (due to osteo-arthritis) disappears when I walk a few minutes.
The article is seriously flawed because of its small sample. Still, it makes a point that I believe could help many people.
The article is seriously flawed because of its small sample. Still, it makes a point that I believe could help many people.
8
How about making that, “Get your heart rate up for 5 minutes.” Your body gets more oxygenated blood, and it moves faster, busting up those very tiny beginning blood clots before they get bigger.
5
As a cardiologist, the 5 minutes walk every hour or so, is one of the best sugestions for a halthy result in a computer sitting ambiance that our society has become. Congratulations for publishing the article!
35
Totally agree. Better still - I bought a stand-up desk. One with a motor. Best thing I ever did. And when I blogged about it recently, I was stunned at the attention the post got. More than anything I'd ever written. Good that the "keep moving" idea is on everyone's mind. Link to the blog: www.damelionetwork.com/event-planners-stand-up-desk-changed-my-life-migh...
1
There is no doubt that interrupting sitting with standing is better than standing for a block of time. However, you do not need to walk for 5 minutes. As I explain in 'Designed to Move' merely standing up every 20 or 30 minutes will do the trick. You can take a restroom break, go to your printer have a stand up meeting or merely stand up and stretch your arms overhead before sitting down again is all it takes. The secret is interrupting the sitting. If you want to walk as well good luck to you.
18
As a manager, I find that 5 minutes away from one's desk results in lost productivity. If a member of my staff wishes to pursue exercise during the work day, I encourage them to do it during the lunch hour. Here, a brisk walk to the nearby McDonalds's enables them to exercise and grab some lunch at the same time. Can't beat a Big Mac, fries, and shake! Talk about multi-tasking, or as they used to say, kill to two birds with one stone. Cheers!
4
Despite the research in front of you (greater happiness, less fatigue, fewer cravings, increased vigor, reduced afternoon slump), you still find that 5 minutes away from the desk results in lost productivity? Perhaps I'm pulling a Sheldon and missing your sarcasm.
18
So you have some 100 people sitting in one big room each of them going for a 5 minute walk every hour. Half of them are men and half are women pretending not to see each other. Kind of busy place then - why not do your work at Grand Central.
2
Why would you say a standing workstation is "... cumbersome and costly, making them impractical for many work situations."? You use a higher table, and stand at it. Where's the cost in that?
6
Hourly workers, especially those that provide "first line" service with customers, don't have that option. You have to be there to answer the phone, greet the patient at the desk, etc. You have to have much more control of your workflow than the average person to be able to do what is suggested. As someone said below, hourly worker here get two 15 minute breaks, and I bet a lot of them don't get to take them.
17
Same thing I've been hearing for the last ten years : 'all you need to do it walk. Simple. Anyone can do it.'
I cannot walk. Since a failed ankle surgery and hobbling about since then, I've gained 30 pounds. Walking is such an important part of maintaining a healthy resting metabolic rate that hardly anybody thinks about anything else. Indeed it works and for years, I needed nothing else but walking and hiking. Its effect go far beyond those in this article, into the digestive efficiency that helps diet make a difference too.
Cycling helps a good deal, but it takes a whole lot of intense work to emulate walking. Weight room, fun but not for weight loss. Swimming is, for me, impossible. What's needed is for a medical researcher to seriously address this issue. The doctors around here all believe, consciously or otherwise, that if you're not out bagging 14K-foot peaks you might as well die.
I've heard there is a kinda conspiracy of courtesy going about, where no part of the medical establishment will study the failures of another specialty. I don't believe that, but it sure sounds right.
Practical comments, especially referrals to journals and clinics that think about this, would be much appreciated.
I cannot walk. Since a failed ankle surgery and hobbling about since then, I've gained 30 pounds. Walking is such an important part of maintaining a healthy resting metabolic rate that hardly anybody thinks about anything else. Indeed it works and for years, I needed nothing else but walking and hiking. Its effect go far beyond those in this article, into the digestive efficiency that helps diet make a difference too.
Cycling helps a good deal, but it takes a whole lot of intense work to emulate walking. Weight room, fun but not for weight loss. Swimming is, for me, impossible. What's needed is for a medical researcher to seriously address this issue. The doctors around here all believe, consciously or otherwise, that if you're not out bagging 14K-foot peaks you might as well die.
I've heard there is a kinda conspiracy of courtesy going about, where no part of the medical establishment will study the failures of another specialty. I don't believe that, but it sure sounds right.
Practical comments, especially referrals to journals and clinics that think about this, would be much appreciated.
9
If you are working for an organization where the board praises colleagues/employees for "having no life"...its time to leave. Its the 21st century. Many congrats on your retirement!
Stand up, stretch, walk around the floor, as long as you are healthy / not facing a physical challenge, never take an elevator 3 floors or less. take the stairs. Apply a little peer pressure to the healthy morons who work in a 50 story building and get into an elevator to move one floor. We will all be a little more fit, a little happier, and get more work done at the same time.
Stand up, stretch, walk around the floor, as long as you are healthy / not facing a physical challenge, never take an elevator 3 floors or less. take the stairs. Apply a little peer pressure to the healthy morons who work in a 50 story building and get into an elevator to move one floor. We will all be a little more fit, a little happier, and get more work done at the same time.
6
How much money can you spend, how many ways can you frame a study to determine if exercise may actually be good for humans? I love the NYT, I really do, and I’ve got no beef with Ms. Reynolds but, how many MDs, PhDs, at prestigious Universities, reported in highly respected Journals, do we need to determine that exercise may actually be good for us? Here’s my study (BTW: I have a BA, MS and a MFA from SUNY Albany and this will be reported in the NYT) go out on the street and determine who looks good and who looks bad. This test may suggest to you that exercise is good for humans!
7
Yes, there are seemingly billions of studies by scientists and social scientists that "prove" either what is obvious or what has already been "proven." Those of us in the humanities wish we could get our hands on some of the vast amounts of money that is used to fund these studies. A lot of what is "discovered" can be found in literature. There is probably a passage in Homer about how walking around the Trojan wall every hour kept the troops optimistic and in shape :) But seriously, literature--written by human beings, of course--teaches us what people need to be happy, what makes them sad, what causes empires to fall, and what makes families work well together or not. Forget all these "studies." Have a read. or just look around with your eyes open.
11
My thoughts exactly!
I wish I could take 5 minutes every hour. Management at my office is really strict- two 15 minute breaks and 1 hour lunch. The rest of the time, you're to be at your desk working. Lucky for the managers, they "walk around" to verify this constantly.
35
A similar method that I've found that works well, but isn't as obviously obtrusive is to use a restroom a few floors up or down and take the stairs. Going up the stairs will also have the added benefit of boosting your heart rate - if you're able to climb them briskly even better.
50
I recently retired from a career in the non-profit realm. My final job was at a community foundation where the ideal was to never ever leave your desk, lest you be seen as lazy, or worse, uncommitted to the mission. Everyone arrived early, left late, and ate lunch at their desks. Breaks? No. Vacations were short, rare, and always meant working remotely. This culture was supported by a board who praised staff as having no life ("that's dedication!"). Not surprising that burnout was common and staff turnover was a time-consuming problem.
Lip service was occasionally paid to "take care of yourself". I hope our workplaces can go beyond these platitudes and actually cultivate a climate in which good, sensible, and healthy advice can be taken to heart daily, not just once a year at a team-building exercise.
Lip service was occasionally paid to "take care of yourself". I hope our workplaces can go beyond these platitudes and actually cultivate a climate in which good, sensible, and healthy advice can be taken to heart daily, not just once a year at a team-building exercise.
64
Very American!
9
As with any scientific research, to claim to have "found" that A causes B (5 min walk breaks causes better performance according to such and such measures), the researchers need to rule out other co-occuring causes as possible explanations of the same results.
Note that, as one commenter brings out, a 5 min. walk break is also just a 5 min. break, and there's plenty of research that demonstrates the benefits of taking a 5 min break every hour. That research doesn't separate out whether break-takers walk, do some other form of exercise, clean a file cabinet or the dishes in the sink, hang around a break area talking with others, or enjoy the outside (while sitting).
Moreover, we can wonder whether exercise (exertion) is responsible, vs. just moving around, minimally activating one's muscles and moving one's internal parts a bit, thus assisting with blood flow and transport of items at the molecular level, but without any more than minimal physical exertion.
To be sure, a 5 min. walk still encompasses all of these potential causes, and so, is guaranteed to be beneficial if any of them is ultimately responsible. But let's be careful to analyze the causes more rigorously.
Note that, as one commenter brings out, a 5 min. walk break is also just a 5 min. break, and there's plenty of research that demonstrates the benefits of taking a 5 min break every hour. That research doesn't separate out whether break-takers walk, do some other form of exercise, clean a file cabinet or the dishes in the sink, hang around a break area talking with others, or enjoy the outside (while sitting).
Moreover, we can wonder whether exercise (exertion) is responsible, vs. just moving around, minimally activating one's muscles and moving one's internal parts a bit, thus assisting with blood flow and transport of items at the molecular level, but without any more than minimal physical exertion.
To be sure, a 5 min. walk still encompasses all of these potential causes, and so, is guaranteed to be beneficial if any of them is ultimately responsible. But let's be careful to analyze the causes more rigorously.
5
Certainly seems painless enough. Maybe impractical to do every hour, but even every other hour is likely to have some benefit to it.
3
it's a 5 minute walk every hour. Not a 5 minute walk every five minutes.
1
I use the pomodoro technique. This combines periods of work (35 minutes) with explicit breaks (2 minutes unless 4 pomodoros have been completed, 5 minutes in that case). I find that explicit breaks help keep me focused during work activity and I can force myself not to be disrupted by urges to check social media, news or the phone.
I always fit walking around in the breaks, but have not forced that in every break. I will definitely give this a shot. The stairs should help.
I always fit walking around in the breaks, but have not forced that in every break. I will definitely give this a shot. The stairs should help.
5
you eat a tomato every 35 minutes?
4
I agree. The Pomodoro Technique is great. 25 minutes of focused work. 5 minutes of walking. As a computer programmer, my productivity is very high when I use this technique.
1
If you are a writer and working intently, you are not going to stop every five minutes to go for a walk. It's ridiculously impractical. If you're translating ideas into words, your mind is concentrating on one thing, and one thing only. Do your work, get it done. Then go take a walk or go to the gym. If you're standing up and leaving your work every five minutes, you're not paying attention to your work -- all you're thinking about is how you'd look on your book jacket photo!
3
I guess you're a writer and not a reader. The article doesn't call for walking every five minutes, it calls for walking five minutes out of every hour. Even a writer can do that - use it as brainstorming time.
24
5 minutes an hour. Not every 5 minutes.
3
Madame X - It appears that you read only the title of the article. Nowhere in the actual article does it say that the workers would work and then stop every five minutes to get up and go for a walk. This is the "five minutes" to which the title refers:
"Finally, during a third visit, the volunteers sat for most of the six hours, but began each hour with five minutes of moderate walking, using treadmills at the clinic."
"Finally, during a third visit, the volunteers sat for most of the six hours, but began each hour with five minutes of moderate walking, using treadmills at the clinic."
4
I'd be interested to know the impact of under-desk exercise machines like peddlers and steppers. I've been considering getting one, but it's not completely clear how beneficial they are -- I'd like to know if the constant, low-level motion they provide is a good substitute for these suggested five-minute walks, or if there are other benefits to the walks besides just the movement.
4
Science is just starting to confirm what nature (and myself and many other people) have known for yrs.
Either extreme in activity is no good, ie the couch potato of the addictive gym rat.
I employed the technic of taking short walking, working breaks every couple of hrs.. at work for 40 yrs. in lieu of talking work on the phone.
It has paid off now...68 and no major health problems.
Either extreme in activity is no good, ie the couch potato of the addictive gym rat.
I employed the technic of taking short walking, working breaks every couple of hrs.. at work for 40 yrs. in lieu of talking work on the phone.
It has paid off now...68 and no major health problems.
6
science has been "reconfirming" this over decades. I'm tired of the studies and the articles. People need to walk around. Just do it.
1
Thank you for your reply Hope....It is the nature of the beast for people to not always do things in their best interest.
These studies, when accurate or believable give people more reasons to do the right thing...
These studies, when accurate or believable give people more reasons to do the right thing...
2
This type of article engenders two opposite responses. One, it's encouragement on ways to build some exercise into daily routines for those who lack it. The other, however, is that if we need to be reminded to "walk up and down a staircase, along a corridor or just pace around your office", you have to wonder why we can't just do something so simple anyway?
2
Hmmmm.....
"Some experts have worried, too, that if people are physically active at the office, they might subsequently become more tired, grumpy, distracted or hungry, any of which could have an undesirable effect on work performance and long-term health."
Oh for Pete's sake. Really? Who in the world are these "experts?" This is one of those presumptions done by clueless folks. It's the sort of thinking that would earn me a smack up side my head by my late grandmother all while she would say "what are you, another college educated idiot?"
Now excuse me while I go take a walk around the office.
John~
American Net'Zen
"Some experts have worried, too, that if people are physically active at the office, they might subsequently become more tired, grumpy, distracted or hungry, any of which could have an undesirable effect on work performance and long-term health."
Oh for Pete's sake. Really? Who in the world are these "experts?" This is one of those presumptions done by clueless folks. It's the sort of thinking that would earn me a smack up side my head by my late grandmother all while she would say "what are you, another college educated idiot?"
Now excuse me while I go take a walk around the office.
John~
American Net'Zen
19
Sitting is evil. I've gained five pounds since starting a new job at the end of October after working from home for many years. I eat measurably less, risk seeming elitist by not indulging in the "treats" people bring in, and bring my own healthy lunch. It's just that my home has lots of stairs, and working from home I was up and down all day. I have small, light hand weights at my desk for breaks, took a 10 to 15 minute walk outside each day when the weather was good, try to get up each hour and walk around a few minutes, but really don't know what to do about the sitting effect. The posture of sitting in a chair with your legs hanging down really does seem bad for you in a way that merely being "sedentary" is not. (By "sedentary" in my case, I mean curled up with a laptop on the couch, feet up, while working.)
5
Try a jump rope. (If the boss will let you). Honest to God, five minutes of jumping rope three or four times a day--it takes a few trys to get the hang of it--will change your life. Make sure the rope is the right size for your height. Incredibly efficient exercise.
10
Exactly what kind of workplace are you in where you can jump rope?
19
If you have your own office, you can probably sneak this in. And lots of starts ups are really great and being accommodating.
2
"...standing workstations .. are cumbersome and costly."
Not true. I made my own for about $25. Using cardboard boxes, experiment until you find how high your keyboard should be off your desk to allow you to work comfortably while standing. Then go shopping - Target, second-hand stores - for a small stool or shelf of the right height.
Result: customized, easy to move aside if you need to sit for a while, cheap.
Not true. I made my own for about $25. Using cardboard boxes, experiment until you find how high your keyboard should be off your desk to allow you to work comfortably while standing. Then go shopping - Target, second-hand stores - for a small stool or shelf of the right height.
Result: customized, easy to move aside if you need to sit for a while, cheap.
14
It is amazing how the pure act of moving can change your whole world. Whether walking or running, it should be a 2017 goal for everyone to Move More.
www.runningcoachresource.com
www.runningcoachresource.com
2
I set a timer for 45 min & do a combo of jumping Jacks and stairs. I also exercise Evey morning. Both are important and, at least in my case, neither is a substitute for the other
11
That's what trips to the coffe room are for.
13
Good to know that it's time well spent moving around.
1