Lose Weight the Fast, Easy, NEAT Way

By Rachelle Bowden in News on Feb 27, 2007 9:14PM

We don't know about you, but those pesky activities like eating, sleeping, cleaning, having a social life and working out? They just get in the way of precious online time. But now, with the help of Mayo Clinic physician and professor of nutrition, James Levine, MD, we can have our virtual cake and eat it too (albeit, on the treadmill).

Levine has designed the NEAT office in which computers sit atop treadmills. NEAT stands for Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis — the scientific term for burning calories at your desk job and in other non-traditional workout settings.

People who used NEAT (conveniently, an acronym and adjective) offices burned an extra 120 calories more per hour than they did sitting. In an eight-hour workday, that could add up to 1,000 extra calories burned — or potentially 1.5 pounds lost per week. Relax, the work done on the treadmill is merely a leisurely stroll at or under 1 m.p.h., so there's no sweating at work (unless a deadline is approaching) and no head-bobbing to keep one from reading the computer screen.

In this world of sometimes borderline insane levels of computer and internet use, it was just a matter of time until this happened — we adapt every possible aspect of our lives around using the computer. Hell, we eat at our desks, sometimes sleep, communicate with the outside world, why not add a treadmill? Or a bar? Or a Chipotle?

Just install a toilet and get the Jetsons' Rosie to clean, and we'll never have to leave our computer again.

Thanks, Amanda!