February 2, 2015 – Sitting and Mortality

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Anchor lead: Too much sitting can increase your risk of death, even if you exercise, Elizabeth Tracey reports

Even if you’re a dedicated exerciser, if you spend too much time sitting down you are at increased mortality risk, a recent study found.  Daniel Kim, chief resident in internal medicine at Johns Hopkins Bayview, interprets the findings.

Kim: A lot of the public health focus has been on exercise, exercise, exercise. I think it’s very important however most of the time we spend much of our day sitting around and we exercise for maybe thirty minutes. But that 8 or 10 hours sitting in front of the computer could also be harmful and it might not be totally reversed by just purely physical activity. And so what’s important to realize from this study is we have to be mindful of how long we are sitting for.  As a general rule moving around, getting up using those muscles is generally a good idea.  :33

Kim says getting up once every hour is also known to improve mental acuity as well.  At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.