Impact of Sit-to-Stand and Treadmill Desks on Patterns of Daily Waking Physical Behaviors Among Overweight and Obese Seated Office Workers: Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial (Preprint)
Authors: Arguello Diego , Cloutier Gregory , Thorndike Anne N , Castaneda Sceppa Carmen , Griffith John , John Dinesh 
Published: May 2023

BACKGROUND

Sit-to-stand and treadmill desks may help sedentary office workers meet the physical activity guideline to “move more and sit less,” but little is known about their long-term impact on altering the accumulation patterns of physical behaviors.

OBJECTIVE

This study explores the impact of sit-to-stand and treadmill desks on physical behavior accumulation patterns during a 12-month multicomponent intervention with an intent-to-treat design in overweight and obese seated office workers.

METHODS

In total, 66 office workers were cluster randomized into a seated desk control (n=21, 32%; 8 clusters), sit-to-stand desk (n=23, 35%; 9 clusters), or treadmill desk (n=22, 33%; 7 clusters) group. Participants wore an activPAL (PAL Technologies Ltd) accelerometer for 7 days at baseline, 3-month follow-up (M3), 6-month follow-up (M6), and 12-month follow-up (M12) and received periodic feedback on their physical behaviors. Analyses of physical behavior patterns included total day and workday number of sedentary, standing, and stepping bouts categorized into durations ranging from 1 to 60 and &gt;60 minutes and usual sedentary, standing, and stepping bout durations. Intervention trends were analyzed using random-intercept mixed linear models accounting for repeated measures and clustering effects.

RESULTS

The treadmill desk group favored prolonged sedentary bouts (&gt;60 min), whereas the sit-to-stand desk group accrued more short-duration sedentary bouts (&lt;20 min). Therefore, compared with controls, sit-to-stand desk users had shorter usual sedentary bout durations short-term (total day ΔM3: −10.1 min/bout, 95% CI −17.9 to −2.2; <i>P</i>=.01; workday ΔM3: −20.3 min/bout, 95% CI −37.7 to −2.9; <i>P</i>=.02), whereas treadmill desk users had longer usual sedentary bout durations long-term (total day ΔM12: 9.0 min/bout, 95% CI 1.6-16.4; <i>P</i>=.02). The treadmill desk group favored prolonged standing bouts (30-60 min and &gt;60 min), whereas the sit-to-stand desk group accrued more short-duration standing bouts (&lt;20 min). As such, relative to controls, treadmill desk users had longer usual standing bout durations short-term (total day ΔM3: 6.9 min/bout, 95% CI 2.5-11.4; <i>P</i>=.002; workday ΔM3: 8.9 min/bout, 95% CI 2.1-15.7; <i>P</i>=.01) and sustained this long-term (total day ΔM12: 4.5 min/bout, 95% CI 0.7-8.4; <i>P</i>=.02; workday ΔM12: 5.8 min/bout, 95% CI 0.9-10.6; <i>P</i>=.02), whereas sit-to-stand desk users showed this trend only in the long-term (total day ΔM12: 4.2 min/bout, 95% CI 0.1-8.3; <i>P</i>=.046). The treadmill desk group accumulated more stepping bouts across various bins of duration (5-50 min), primarily at M3. Thus, treadmill desk users had longer usual stepping bout durations in the short-term compared with controls (workday ΔM3: 4.8 min/bout, 95% CI 1.3-8.3; <i>P</i>=.007) and in the short- and long-term compared with sit-to-stand desk users (workday ΔM3: 4.7 min/bout, 95% CI 1.6-7.8; <i>P</i>=.003; workday ΔM12: 3.0 min/bout, 95% CI 0.1-5.9; <i>P</i>=.04).

CONCLUSIONS

Sit-to-stand desks exerted potentially more favorable physical behavior accumulation patterns than treadmill desks. Future active workstation trials should consider strategies to promote more frequent long-term movement bouts and dissuade prolonged static postural fixity.

CLINICALTRIAL

ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02376504; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02376504