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Researchers call for mandatory physical exercise during working hours

Published by
August 11, 2020
health check at healthgroup

Too many hours of sedentary or monotonous work puts us out of balance. That's why we should exercise on the job, say researchers.

Human ancestors, who were hunter-gatherers on the African savannah, developed the ability to outrun animals. On foot, they killed their prey so they could get something to eat.

On the savannah, man evolved to become a running animal.

But people no longer run for survival. Nowadays, many people earn their living by sitting in front of a screen all day long.

Easy and convenient, perhaps, but evidence suggests that sedentary working life is not optimal for the body's health.

Hundreds of thousands of Danes are overweight. More than 240,000 have type 2 diabetes, and studies show that one third suffer from neck or shoulder pain every week.

"We need to think outside the box and change society as a whole," says Chris MacDonald, who has been researching exercise as a treatment for type 2 diabetes with researchers from the Trygfonden Center for Active Health. Read about it in the article Exercise works against diabetes in scientific trial.

Genetic mismatch

We have ended up in a genetic mismatch. Completely out of step with our genetics, which are as old as the hunter-gatherers who hunted and killed animals on the African savannah, writes Chris MacDonald in his latest book 'Non-negotiable - The Equation of Life'.

Humans were not designed to move as little as they do today, he writes. Inactive modern life is making us sick. To achieve balance, we need to incorporate more exercise into our daily lives.

"For example, we can start thinking about training in the context of workplaces," suggests Chris MacDonald.

"Over the next twenty years, I hope that it will become an integral part of our culture that of course we have half an hour during the working day where we exercise. It should be something we just do. Just like we eat lunch," he adds.

More training during working hours

Exercise should be mandatory at work, according to researchers who have studied the benefits of spending a small amount of working time moving.

"We need more training in the workplace," says Just Bendix Justesen, who advises companies on implementing training programs and is also a senior researcher at the University of Southern Denmark's Department of Sports Science and Biomechanics.

"It should be acceptable for exercise to be something you do during working hours. So that all those people who never exercise in their free time because they don't have the time and energy to do it, get it done," he continues.

Employees are getting healthier

Just Bendix Justesen and colleagues from SDU have conducted a study that shows a link between exercise during working hours and better health.

In the trial, 200 office workers who exercised for one hour a week during working hours were compared with 200 others who did not exercise.

Office workers who exercised for one hour a week while at work had significantly better health outcomes, including fitness and blood pressure, than the control group, according to the study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

One third have neck and shoulder pain

In the above-mentioned trial, office workers exercised once a week with a regular instructor. They were also encouraged to exercise for half an hour a day in their free time.

However, less radical measures can also benefit the health of working people, according to studies by the National Research Center for the Working Environment (NFA).

Researchers at the center have repeatedly tested whether exercises for the neck, shoulders and back help relieve pain. Every week, one third of all Danes have pain in this part of the body, according to studies.

"We have conducted more than ten randomized trials of exercise in a variety of workplaces such as offices, laboratories, construction sites, slaughterhouses and in the care sector," says Lars L. Andersen, a professor at NFA and head of the research.

"Across the job groups, training helps with the pain," he continues.

NFA's research on the effect of training during working hours has been published in scientific journals. See for example here, here, here, here, here and here.

Strength training significantly reduces pain

Lars L. Andersen and his colleagues have, among other things, studied what office workers get out of exercising 3 times 20 minutes a week.

"It was targeted strength training in the areas of the body where they had pain. The training significantly reduced their pain compared to a control group who cycled three times a week," says Lars L. Andersen.

"We went on to other job groups where we found the same thing. We also looked at social cohesion. It was strengthened by the fact that the employees trained together," he adds.

Reserved professor: Untimely interference

The researchers recommend that training should be mandatory and structured. Otherwise, it will fall flat and only those employees who are already fit will show up.

A third, Helge Hvid, who has not conducted research on exercise during working hours but has many years of experience as a health and safety researcher, has reservations about the idea of introducing compulsory exercise.

"I'm afraid that there are some employees who don't think it's a good idea. They will see it as undue interference in their way of life," says Helge Hvid, professor emeritus at Roskilde University's Center for Working Life Research.

"Some people don't think that the workplace should decide whether they should exercise or not. You have to take that into account. If there is too much resistance, it won't work," he continues.

Making sense of the madness is crucial

If a company introduces a mandatory training program against the will of its employees, it can have consequences for the relationship between managers and employees, warns Helge Hvid.

"Management loses legitimacy and authority if it introduces something that people think is stupid," he says.

It is crucial that employees can see the point of the training, that management is committed, and that someone takes the initiative and sticks with it. This can either be someone who is employed to do so, or an enthusiast in the workplace, say the researchers.

In an upcoming article here at Videnskab.dk, you can read the researchers' tips on how to get started exercising at work.