To Stand or to Sit - that is the question

There have been a number of articles lately in the press regarding the standing vs sitting at desks in the workplace or classroom and the potential health benefits of this.

The British Heart Foundation has endorsed a Get Britain Standing campaign to get office workers to stand, use the stairs and move around more.

At Winberry Associates we have specified height adjustable desks for many of our clients and try and encourage the inclusion of such desks in all new furniture projects.

A few months ago we helped a homeworker who suffers from severe back pain that was stopping him from being able to work. We discussed his needs and then redesigned his home office and supplied an electric height adjustable desk. This has since enabled him to resume working as he can very easily adjust the desk to suit his condition.

It was not long after this project that I decided to try a similar change to my own workstation by purchasing a Varidesk Pro Plus 48 (we have no connection with the supplier). This meant that I could retain my existing office furniture and just reposition my monitor, laptop and keyboard onto the Varidesk. By manually releasing two sprung handles I can move my workstation from sitting to standing and anywhere in between very easily. An app is available too which you can set for different time periods if you want to control and monitor how long you stand for. It also tells you how many calories have been burnt whilst standing. Allegedly you burn around 50% more calories when standing vs sitting – whether that’s accurate or not I’m certainly standing more these days which can’t be bad.