We all know that the key to living a long, healthy life is to eat right and exercise.
But to achieve this, should you exhaust yourself as much as possible at the gym or take 10,000 steps a day?
In fact, daily activities themselves, if practiced with more rigor and energy, can bring enormous benefits. Like running up the stairs, briskly walking around the house, or playing with your kids or pets.
If you’ve been following advances in exercise science over the past three years, you may have discovered a new term: low-intensity intermittent vigorous physical activity (Vilpa).
It is described by several nicknames: “activity microsessions” is one of them.
It’s the last word in solving an old problem: what’s the best way to convince the most reluctant to spend less time sitting and move more?
Over the past decade, high-intensity interval training (HIIT) has become a popular exercise among people who don’t have time to go to the gym.
HIIT involves pushing your body to its limits in short, explosive bursts, whether by running, cycling, or doing physical exercises like squats or jumping jacks.
This technique has been shown to improve control of blood sugar and cholesterol, blood pressure and body fat.
Vilpa is a shortened form of HIIT, according to professor of sports and exercise medicine Mark Hamer of University College London. It’s simply a matter of performing your daily activities with a little more energy, to increase your heart rate a minute or two at a time.
Hamer says the idea for Vilpa first came to him when he and his colleagues were analyzing movement data collected by wearable devices on the wrists of people who weren’t doing formal exercise.
Scientists have observed that, although they do not play sports or attend gyms, some individuals engage in considerable levels of physical activity, simply to go about their daily lives. Their movements range from brisk walking sessions to getting to work and climbing stairs.
“A lot of this movement accumulates in very short sessions,” he says. “This led to the concept of microsessions.”
To their surprise, Hamer and his colleagues discovered a correlation between these micro-movement sessions and their health benefits.
A 2022 study used data from 25,241 people in the UK. Hamer and scientists from the University of Sydney, Australia, concluded that just three or four one-minute Vilpa sessions per day are enough to reduce the risk of premature death from all causes by 40%, and the risk of death from cardiovascular disease by 49%, compared to people who did little movement.
A more recent study also concluded that just over four minutes of Vilpa per day can offset some of the heart health risks of a sedentary lifestyle.
“By performing daily activities in quick, higher-intensity bursts, several times throughout the day, people can still benefit from health benefits and reduce the risk of chronic diseases,” says postdoctoral researcher Matthew Ahmadi from the University of Sydney.
“Vilpa can also help fight against fragility, which becomes very important with age,” according to him.
Ahmadi describes these discoveries as incredible.
Research shows that the majority of British adults over 40 do not play sport or exercise regularly. This is often due to time constraints or other difficulties.
This finding reflects a worrying global trend. The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that around 1.8 billion adults are at risk of disease because they do not get enough physical activity.
“We all know that physical activity is good for our health, but many of us don’t get enough exercise,” says Amanda Daley, professor of behavioral medicine, from Loughborough University in the United Kingdom.
“There are several reasons for this and the most common is lack of time,” she explains.
“The technique of practicing physical activity with microexercises (or Vilpa) requires only a few minutes of people’s time, a few times a day throughout the week, making it very simple, accessible and inexpensive.”
Vilpa demonstrates that simply adjusting your day so that you can run to catch the bus, walk briskly around the house when doing household chores, or do housework or gardening with a little more energy can make a significant difference in your health.
Add to that starting to devote more energy to playing with your children and pets. These are all examples of Vilpa in everyday life.
“We have different opportunities to engage in moderate to vigorous activity, not necessarily through formal exercise or specialized gym equipment,” says Ahmadi.
“If you’re going out for a walk, adding short bursts of faster walking can be an easy way to practice Vilpa.”
Research shows that people respond positively to the idea, highlighting the benefits of this type of activity which, until recently, was not considered health-promoting.
Researchers such as Ahmadi and cardiologist Shigenori Ito, from Sankuro Hospital, Japan, say the Vilpa concept can be used as a way to increase resistance, doing activities such as carrying heavy shopping bags every day and working the muscles of the legs and joints, by quickly climbing a flight of stairs.
The idea of microactivity sessions clearly fits into a new doctrine that exercise researchers want to encourage: that when it comes to physical activity, doing something is better than nothing.
According to the NCD Alliance, which aims to combat the steady rise in chronic or non-communicable diseases worldwide, up to five million deaths could be avoided each year if more people practiced sufficient physical activity.
“Globally, our lifestyles are becoming increasingly sedentary,” says Katie Dain, executive director of the NCD Alliance.
“In short, more people are sitting in offices and many of our cities are designed more for cars than for humans.”
Fighting this is not easy.
Japan, for example, is becoming an increasingly sedentary nation. Hosting the 2020 Tokyo Olympics apparently made no difference, worrying doctors like Ito.
“A sedentary lifestyle is one of the main cardiovascular risk factors, alongside hypertension, smoking and diabetes,” according to him.
That’s why researchers sought to make physical activity goals less intimidating.
Many people are familiar with the recommendation to take 10,000 steps a day, but the most recent scientific findings show that we can reap health benefits by walking significantly less each day.
One of the largest step counting studies ever conducted concluded that 2,517 to 2,735 steps per day are enough to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by 11%, compared to 2,000 steps per day.
Another study found that any number over 2,200 steps per day reduces the risk of heart disease and premature death.
“Something is better than nothing,” says Professor Rana Hinman of the Department of Physiotherapy at the University of Melbourne, Australia.
“Even people with chronic joint pain, who have conditions such as osteoarthritis, and who are often inactive, can benefit from low activity.”
Physical activity microsessions are one way to achieve this goal.
Research indicates, for example, that just three to four minutes of Vilpa per day can reduce the risk of cancer by 17 to 18 percent. One reason likely has to do with the known anti-inflammatory effects of exercise.
Inflammation is part of the body’s natural immune response and helps us avoid disease, but excessive inflammation is linked to conditions such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity.
Hamer also points out that the physiological process of muscle contractions generates a series of biochemical reactions important for the metabolism of fats and glucose in our body.
“That’s why any type of movement will always benefit sedentary people, especially if it can increase their heart rate and stimulate the heart, lungs and circulation,” he says.
New knowledge may emerge in the future. Researchers want to determine whether microsessions can help improve the health of people who have chronic illnesses and may have difficulty performing otherwise structured exercises.
Hamer also wants to know if encouraging people to do more micro-sessions of activity could be a starting point to help them achieve 150 minutes of moderate physical activity per week, which is the benchmark for good health according to public health guidelines.
“If we can get the majority of the population to do a few micro-exercise sessions, it will be much more effective than if a few people follow the guidelines,” he explains.
So if you’re worried about not going to the gym for a while, you might want to do Vilpa.
Whether it’s taking the stairs instead of the elevator, picking up the pace next time you go shopping, playing more with the dog in the yard, or vacuuming a little harder, there are simple things we can do every day to get rid of illnesses and even prolong our lives.
Read the original version of this report (in English) on the site BBC Innovation.
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