TOO MUCH SITTING PREDISPOSES YOU TO STROKE

Sitting too much can boost your risk of a stroke, but adding more movement – even low-effort activity such as doing household chores – may help lower that risk, according to a study in the 1 June 2022 issue of JAMA Network Open.

The study involved 7,607 adults who wore a hip-mounted accelerometer (a device that records how fast you move) for a week. Their average age was 63. During a follow-up period averaging 7.4 years, 246 of the participants experienced a stroke.

People who sat for 13 or more hours per day during the initial week of motion tracking were 44% more likely to have a stroke compared with those who’d spent less than 11 hours per day sitting still.

In addition, longer bouts of sitting (more than 17 minutes at a time) were linked to a higher risk than shorter bouts (less than 8 minutes), Harvard Health reports.