Stair Climbing: Easy, Cheap, and Effective Path to Cardiorespiratory Fitness

Home-based stair climbing is a low-cost, time-efficient exercise that boosts fitness, lowers disease risk, and improves heart health

SANTA BARBARA, CA, UNITED STATES, April 23, 2025 /EINPresswire.com/ -- “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,” states Elpida Michael, MSc., Sports Physiology.

What does Elpida Michael report in “Home-Based Stair Climbing as an Intervention for Disease Risk in Adult Females; A Controlled Study” published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2021, 18, 603?:

“Levels of physical activity, and the associated beneficial effects on cardiorespiratory fitness, blood pressure, serum lipids and blood sugar concentrations, can be protective.

Increased physical activity is a persistent target to improve population health in the developed world. If possible, vigorous activity will confer more protection than activity of moderate intensity.

This study tested the effects of an eight-week intervention for increased stair climbing on aerobic fitness, leg power, serum lipids, body composition and fasting blood glucose, as well as resting cardiovascular variables, in sedentary females.

Stair climbing is a vigorous physical activity, even at slow speeds, that can increase cardiorespiratory fitness with a lower time commitment than conventional physical activities.

Stair climbing is a vigorous activity because it requires participants to raise all their body mass against gravity. Energy expenditure is proportional to mass raised and speed of climbing is a relatively small contributor to metabolic cost."

Read Elpida Michael’s article: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/2/603

Dr. Greg Vigna, MD, JD, Board Certified Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and national neurological injury attorney, states, “Stair climbing is probably the most efficient path to fitness as it is classified as a vigorous exercise. For a sedentary person under sixty years old with no cardiac history, who wants to begin training for fitness, I would recommend walking five days a week at a level where talking is possible but not comfortable. Then, after about a month, begin to add stair climbing during the 45 minutes, ascending 300 stairs two days a week, and then increasing by 300 stairs every two to four weeks until 1500 is achieved. Stair climbing will produce improvement in cardiopulmonary fitness, strength, and coordination that will reduce the risk of falls as we age.”

The Vigna Law Group is a national pharmaceutical and neurological injury law firm. Greg Vigna, MD, JD, is a national pharmaceutical injury attorney, Board Certified PM&R, and life care planner. He is also an active dog walker and stair climber. He is available for legal consultation at Vigna Law Group.

Greg Vigna, MD, JD
Vigna Law Group
+1 8178099023
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