Background
Sitting time is a prevalent health risk among office-based workers.
Purpose
To examine, using a pilot study, the efficacy of an intervention to reduce office
workers' sitting time.
Design
Quasi-experimental design with intervention-group participants recruited from a single
workplace that was physically separate from the workplaces of comparison-group participants.
Setting/participants
Office workers (Intervention, n=18; Comparison, n=14) aged 20–65 years from Brisbane, Australia; data were collected and analyzed in
2011.
Intervention
Installation of a commercially available sit–stand workstation.
Main outcome measures
Changes from baseline at 1-week and 3-month follow-up in time spent sitting, standing,
and stepping at the workplace and during all waking time (activPAL3 activity monitor,
7-day observation). Fasting total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol,
triglycerides, and glucose levels were assessed at baseline and 3 months (Cholestech
LDX Analyzer). Acceptability was assessed with a 5-point response scale (eight items).
Results
The intervention group (relative to the comparison group) reduced sitting time at
1-week follow-up by 143 minutes/day at the workplace (95% CI= −184, −102) and 97 minutes/day
during all waking time (95% CI= −144, −50). These effects were maintained at 3 months
(−137 minutes/day and −78 minutes/day, respectively). Sitting was almost exclusively
replaced by standing, with minimal changes to stepping time. Relative to the comparison
group, the intervention group increased HDL cholesterol by an average of 0.26 mmol/L
(95% CI=0.10, 0.42). Other biomarker differences were not significant. There was strong
acceptability and preference for using the workstations, though some design limitations
were noted.
Conclusions
This trial is the first with objective measurement and a comparison group to demonstrate
that the introduction of a sit–stand workstation can substantially reduce office workers'
sitting time both at the workplace and overall throughout the week.
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© 2012 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
