Home-Based Stair Climbing as an Intervention for Disease Risk in Adult Females; A Controlled Study

Elpida Michael, Michael J. White and Frank F. Eves
Additional contact information
Elpida Michael: School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK
Michael J. White: School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK
Frank F. Eves: School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 2, 1-14

Abstract: Cardiovascular disease and the metabolic syndrome are major contributors to health care expenditure. Increased physical activity reduces disease risk. The study compared effects of walking up and down stairs at home with continuous, gym-based stair climbing on the disease risk factors of aerobic fitness, serum lipids, body composition, fasting blood glucose, and resting cardiovascular variables. Sedentary women (31.7 ± 1.4 years) were randomly assigned to home-based ( n = 26) or gym-based ( n = 24) climbing for five days.week −1 over an eight-week period. Each ascent required a 32.8-m climb, with home-based climbing matching the vertical displacement in the gym. Participants progressed from two ascents.day −1 to five ascents.day −1 in weeks 7 and 8. Relative to controls, stair climbing improved aerobic fitness ( V ? O 2 max +1.63 mL.min −1 .kg −1 , 95% CI = 1.21–2.05), body composition (weight −0.99 kg, 95% CI = 1.38–0.60), and serum lipids (LDL cholesterol −0.20 mmol.L −1 , 95% CI = 0.09–0.31; triglycerides −0.21 mmol.L −1 , 95% CI = 0.15–0.27), with similar risk reductions for home and gym-based groups. Only the home-based protocol reduced fasting blood glucose. Discussion focuses on stair climbing bouts as time-efficient exercise and the potential benefits of a home-based intervention. Stair use at home offers a low-cost intervention for disease risk reduction to public health.

Keywords: cardiovascular disease risk; the metabolic syndrome; stair climbing; cardiorespiratory fitness; serum lipids; body composition; blood glucose; home-based vs. gym-based exercise (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/2/603/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/2/603/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:2:p:603-:d:479054

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().