What is the sitting-rising test, and what does it say about your life expectancy?
A low SRT score is associated with a considerably higher risk of death, but that does not mean the score determines your fate. Think of it as a signal to work on strength, balance and flexibility.
The sitting-rising test (SRT) is a simple self-test: you sit down on the floor without any aids and then stand back up, without using your hands, knees or any other body part for support. Each time you do use a knee, hand or forearm, a point is deducted from your score. The maximum score is 10. In a single movement, the test measures four things at once: muscle strength, flexibility, balance and body composition.
In a Brazilian cohort of nearly four thousand adults aged 46 to 75, people of middle to older age with the lowest scores (0 to 4) were found to die from cardiovascular disease more than six times as often as people with the highest scores over a period of just over twelve years. The difference was also large for all-cause mortality: 42% of the lowest scorers died during that period, compared with just 3.7% of those with a perfect score of 10. Each additional point on the scale was associated with a 21% greater chance of surviving the follow-up period.
An important caveat: these are associations, not proven causes. People with a low score are on average older, less fit and more often have other risk factors for early death. The analyses were adjusted for age, sex and weight, but not for every possible factor. A low score therefore does not determine your life expectancy; the score most likely reflects a more general level of fitness that is associated with health risks.
The test is nonetheless useful as a mirror: anyone who struggles to get up and down from the floor can use that as a prompt to work specifically on strength, flexibility and balance. That is beneficial for long-term health regardless of the test.
The evidence comes from two Brazilian cohorts (one of just over two thousand and one of just over four thousand adults) in which participants were followed for six and twelve years respectively. The associations are robust and consistent, but these are observational studies: no one was randomly assigned, and cause and effect cannot be separated. The findings have not been confirmed in large, independent studies outside Brazil.