Review article

Croatian 24-Hour Guidelines for Physical Activity, Sedentary Behaviour, and Sleep: A Proposal Based on a Systematic Review of Literature

Danijel Jurakić
Željko Pedišić

Abstract

A modern approach to shaping public health guidelines is to integrate recommendations for physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and sleep and to recommend the optimal distribution of time spent in these behaviours in a 24-hour day. The aim of this paper was to conduct a systematic review of literature to identify and analyse the available 24-hour guidelines for physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and sleep, and to propose Croatian 24-hour guidelines in line with the existing findings.
The systematic review of literature showed 24-hour guidelines from the World Health Organization (WHO) and national 24-hour guidelines for children and youth (0 – 17 years of age) in four countries (Australia, South Africa, Canada, and New Zealand). No such guidelines were found for adults and seniors. All the available 24-hour guidelines for children and youth are very similar, as they are based on the Canadian national guidelines. The quantitative recommendations are all the same, with differences found only in specific examples and descriptions of activities.
Given that the foregoing guidelines were formulated in line with the best available scientific evidence, they were used to inform the development of the proposed Croatian 24-hour guidelines for children and youth. The proposed guidelines were tailored to the specific context in Croatia.
Since no integrated 24-hour guidelines for physical activity, sedentary behaviour, and sleep for adults and seniors were found in the systematic review of literature, an additional thorough review of literature was conducted in order to identify the most relevant guidelines for each individual behaviour. The proposed Croatian 24-hour guidelines for adults and seniors were based on the WHO guidelines and the most recent and relevant national recommendations from other countries for each of the behaviours.
The proposed Croatian 24-hour guidelines can be used: (1) to provide individual counselling in general practice clinics, medical clinics, and recreation centres; (2) to help formulate messages in public health campaigns; and (3) to develop national, local, and institutional health policies.

Keywords

physical activity; sedentary behaviour; sleep; 24-hour guidelines

Hrčak ID:

227109

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/227109

Publication date:

28.10.2019.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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