Why your standing desk isn’t the health hack you thought it was

Over the past few years, many workplaces and people have hopped on the standing desk trend to promote health in the workplace or office.

But it turns out having a standing desk isn’t really all it’s stood up to be.

“We’ve all heard about how bad being sedentary is to our health, and we think of sedentary as, you know, sitting or laying down,” Dr. Angela Hsu said.

The internist and geriatrician with Kaiser Permanente talked with WTOP about the new study, which would appear to show standing isn’t any better than sitting when it comes to your health.

“They had more than 80,000 patients wear accelerometers,” Hsu said of the study, which was published in the Oxford Academic International Journal of Epidemiology.

What researchers found, she said, is that being stationary while standing versus sitting had no real difference when it came to the cardiovascular health of patients.

But that’s not even the most startling finding.

“Standing without movement is not doing that much better for us, and in fact, might be having other health risks associated, like getting leg swelling and varicose veins, and things like that,” Hsu told WTOP.

She said the study is affirmation that there’s no silver bullet, or secret health hack, when it comes to your heart health — or your health in general.

“The key to improving your cardiovascular outcomes and combating the effects of sedentary lifestyles is to be active and actually moving, and not just standing,” she said.

Hsu said she, and many in the medical community, knows it can be hard during the workday, but there are hacks you can try to stay active.

“Some people will do walking meetings,” she said. “If you can’t do walking meetings, maybe go for a walk between your meetings. If you’re working from home, go outside for a little bit in between, because you have to get that blood flowing. That’s the key.”

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