If you sit for 2, 3 or 4 hours at a time, your workouts are pointless. It’s not sitting itself that’s bad; it’s prolonged sitting, some of the unhealthiest people I ever met were MMO gamers, and I’ve had several friends quit playing after their health deteriorated from too much.
From a chiropractic standpoint, you run the risk of two kinds of problems: musculoskeletal and metabolic. On the musculoskeletal side, you are at risk of a compromised posture, because sitting puts pressure on the lumbar discs in your lower back, pushing your head forward and causing your shoulders to rotate inward. This puts pressure on your lower back, neck and shoulders. Over time, this leads to arthritis,
disc degeneration and a host of many issues.
On the metabolic side, your energy expenditure drops to nothing, according to the National Institutes of Health. You literally burn one calorie an hour. You also keep your muscles relaxed, which slows down your metabolism, thus raising your risk of obesity, metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes. Plus, it’s bad for your cardiovascular system and blood pressure.
National Cancer Institute, even asserts that prolonged sitting increases your risk of certain cancers. In that study who spent 10 hours a day sitting had an 8 percent higher chance of colon cancer and a 10 percent higher risk for endometrial cancer, than women who sat for 8 hours daily.
The solution: Stand or walk every hour for 5 to 10 minutes at a time. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also recommends regularly taking a brisk lunchtime walk of 30 minutes or so.
Dr. Laurie Dady