A Chair Cushion Won’t Protect You In The Office
Saturday, December 17th, 2011As if the traditional complaints of backaches, saddle sores and eyestrain weren’t bad enough, multiple studies are linking prolonged sitting at work to a variety of health problems including weight gain and even cancer. Even if you have a comfortable chair cushion , sitting for prolonged periods puts a stretching load on cells in the body that causes “pre-fat” cells to turn into true fat cells more quickly than they would otherwise. Even worse, many studies have been published which link breast and colon cancer to inactivity.
Getting up from your desk and moving around for a few minutes is definitely necessary to avoid these types of problems. Putting in an hour at the gym every day is a great idea, but it doesn’t counteract the bad effects of hours of uninterrupted sitting. So get up and walk around. If your feet hurt a comfortable pair of foam inserts for your shoes should help make standing less unpleasant. And most people find the break from their desk a welcome one, however brief it may be.
Some health experts are advising the more widespread use of standing desks and, believe it or not, treadmill desks. These innovations may become common in the future. If so, we can only hope that the transition is gradual, to cushion office workers from the shock of getting to work one day and finding treadmills in front of their computers. Imagine! If the treadmills were hooked up to generators, they could be used to power the computers!