Stand Up to Work: assessing the health impact of adjustable workstations

Abstract

Purpose Sedentary behavior is linked to health risks, and prolonged sitting is prevalent among office workers. Adjustable workstations (AWS) promote health by allowing transitions between sitting and standing. Stand Up to Work compares workers with AWS to traditional desks (TD). The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach Employees were randomly selected from one office floor to receive AWS, two identical floors maintained TD. Participants received workplace wellness and ergonomic training, completed self-administered questionnaires, and responded to repeated micropolling at baseline (T0), 3 (T1), 6 (T2), and 12 (T3) months in Atlanta, 2015-2016. Groups were compared using two-sample t-tests and nonparametric Wilcoxon tests. Findings Compared to TD (n = 24), participants with AWS (n = 24) reported significantly less sedentary behavior at T1 and T2 after AWS installation (p<0.05), with a retention rate at T2 of 80 and 65 percent for the AWS and TD group, respectively. In all, 47 percent of participants with AWS reported decline in upper back, shoulder, and neck discomfort (p=0.04); 88 percent of AWS participants reported convenience to use, 65 percent reported increased productivity, and 65 percent reported positive impact outside the workplace. Individuals with normal or underweight body mass index (BMI) reported a significantly greater decline in percent of time sitting compared to participants with overweight or obese BMI at all three time points. Originality/value AWS are beneficial in reducing sedentary behavior in and outside the workplace. Behavioral changes were sustained over time and associated with less self-reported muscle pain, more self-reported energy, and awareness of standing. When considering total worker health, employers should include options for AWS to promote reducing sedentary behavior.

Influence of Spatial Layout of Residential Buildings on Sedentary Behaviour of Residents in Enugu, Nigeria

“…This seems to also resonate with the goal of active design, which is to encourage physical activity at home as explained in the literature [26]. Again, this may provide support to the submission of previous authors that the distance required to reach key destinations in residential buildings such as bed rooms, living rooms, kitchen, washrooms and others could affect occupants' sedentary lifestyle [24,25].…”

“…Active design impacts on human health by helping building occupants integrate regular physical activity into their daily life unconsciously [22,23]. Based on the principles of active design, it seems feasible that layout of homes and, in particular, the distance required to reach key destinations in residential buildings such as bed rooms, living rooms, kitchens, washrooms and others could affect both occupants' levels of movement and time spent sitting or lying [24,25]. For example, the Center for Active Design [26] had noted that having staircase, appealing, supportive walking routes such as lobbies and corridors and location of functions within buildings to encourage walking can promote physical activity and the health of occupants.…”

Effects of sedentary behaviour interventions on biomarkers of cardiometabolic risk in adults: systematic review with meta-analyses

“…Four studies were also rated as ‘high’ RoB due to deviations from intended interventions (data not analysed according to intention-to-treat principles 40 58 74 79 ) and missing outcome data. 76 79 83 87 An unclear risk level was typically assigned based on inadequate reporting of randomisation (k=12), concerns with missing outcome data (k=11) and/or bias in measurement of the outcome (k=9). Low risk was still permitted with lack of blinding, given the context (behavioural intervention) in which allocation is impossible to conceal from participants and is generally known to staff, and in which outcomes are collected objectively.…”

The Effectiveness of Sedentary Behaviour Reduction Workplace Interventions on Cardiometabolic Risk Markers: A Systematic Review

“…In general, because of the naturalistic settings in which these studies took place, the overall risk of bias among individual studies was moderate (see Table 4). Despite the use of cluster randomisation techniques and allocation blinding, baseline imbalances were a high source of bias in five studies [45,59,62,63,78]. Contamination during the intervention due to spillover effects may have biased findings in six studies [63,67,68 four interventions that increased fat-free mass/total lean mass [45,64,67,75], one intervention that reduced body fat percentage [67], and one intervention that reduced total fat mass [75].…”

“…53,58,[61][62][63]69,74,78] did not result in improvements in cardiometabolic risk markers.3.4.4 Active controlsOf the ten active control conditions[46,47,[50][51][52][53][54]58,63,77], none reported any improvement in cardiometabolic risk markers; however, Healy et al[51] found that the (active) control group experienced a significant worsening of clustered cardiometabolic risk scores, fasting glucose levels, and HOMA2-%S levels compared to baseline.3.5 Sedentary behaviour outcomesOf the 20 interventions which showed an improvement in at least one cardiometabolic risk marker[45,50-52,54,59,62,64-68,70-73,75-77,79], fifteen (75%) also reported significantly reducing (p < 0.05) sedentary behaviour [45,50-52,54,59,62,64-68,71-73]. The remaining five did not report on sedentary behaviour change.…”