Sitting time and body mass index of malaysian cancer survivors

• Main Authors: Mohd Razif, Shahril, Sulaiman, S, Reilly, J
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2014
• Subjects: RC0254 Neoplasms. Tumors. Oncology (including Cancer)
• Online Access: http://eprints.unisza.edu.my/4707/1/FH02-FPSK-14-02130.pdf; http://eprints.unisza.edu.my/4707/
• Institution: Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin

Recent epidemiologic evidence suggests that too much sitting has deleterious effects on metabolic health. Little is known about sitting time in Malaysian cancer survivors. The present study aimed to investigate time spent sitting and its relationship to EMI. A convenience sample In = 64, 51.6% gynecology & 48.4% colorectal cancer survivors] was recruited from outpatient oncol-ogy clinics of the University Science Malaysia Medical Center, Kelantan and Kuala Lumpur Hospital. The subjects self-report sitting time using the Global Physical Activity Questionnaire [GPAQ] version2. Information on anthropometric measurements, body composition and cancer treatment history was also collected. Almost half of the subjects were within 6 months of completion of cancer therapy. Their mean age was 52.2 ± 8.9 years with mean body mass index [EMI] of 26.5 ± 5.4 kg/m2 and mean body fat percentage of 33.0 ± 10.5. BM! was strongly associated with body fat Ir = 0.75, p < 0.001] and age [r = 0.25, p < 0.049]. The mean reported sitting time was 227mins/day with a range of 30-540 minutes. Sitting time was significantly negatively correlated with moderate to vigorous intensity activity (r = —0.29 to —0.37] but not with BM! in this study. Many factors may have contributed to the absence of a correlation between sitting and BMI in the present study. Assessing sitting time is a new area in cancer survivorship studies in addition to assessing physical activity and further research directed towards sitting time and engaging more time in light physical activity need to be addressed.