Workplace Fitness: How on-the-job exercise can be bad for your heart

I love to exercise (most of the time) but it's not always easy to squeeze it into my busy schedule. Of course there's always time for work, and I've been jealous in the past of people who have jobs they love that keep them moving -- like fitness instructors at the gym and professional athletes. How great would it be to have physical exercise be a part of your everyday life without any real scheduling efforts on your part? I mean, I know regular exercise is a lifestyle choice for all of us (or should be) but it would be so much easier if it just came, whether you liked it or not, as part of how you make your living.

That's just my "I wish" spoiled side coming out, and in truth after reading this article I'm not so sure all the physical jobs out there are so great after all. Because although exercise and physical fitness have long been attributed with helping reduce the risk of cardiovascular and heart disease, it seems that if that exercise comes related to work the benefits might not be there. And not only do physically demanding jobs not necessarily reduce heart disease risk, but in many cases they actually make it worse!
It's really not about the work itself, but the stress that often comes along with jobs of a physical nature. A study in this past July's issue of the the American Journal of Medicine says that often jobs with more physical work are also jobs that are more stressful and demanding, usually due to insecurities or rushed schedules and deadlines.

So stress is to blame!

That's good, if only because at least stress is something we already knew to look out for. And the "stress" theme seems to hold true in this study in that non-stressed and happy physically employed adults (like aerobics instructors) didn't follow the same patterns of increased cardiovascular problems and instead got the same heart-healthy benefits we all expect from fitness.

So does this mean those hunky construction workers aren't as healthy as they look?