Replacing sitting with standing and walking improves cholesterol

Substituting standing and light walking in place of sitting may help overweight people improve specific types of lipids (fats) in their blood, a small study finds. Twenty-four sedentary older adults who were overweight or obese followed two activity regimens. Each lasted four days with a 10-day break in between. During the "Sit" intervention, researchers told participants to reduce standing and walking to no more than one hour per day. During the "SitLess" intervention, participants were asked to replace seven hours per day of sitting time with at least four hours of light walking and at least three hours of standing per day, and to interrupt their remining sitting time every 30 minutes with standing or walking. Adherence was monitored with an accelerometer, and blood samples were drawn the day after each intervention period ended. Following the SitLess regimen, the participants experienced beneficial changes in several lipid values, including lower levels of triglycerides and a type of small, dense LDL cholesterol particles, which are considered the most dangerous type. The study was published in the April 2025 issue of Atherosclerosis.

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