Lithuanian Sports University e-Journals
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Predictors of Confidence in Digital Technology Use for Online Physical Activity in Rural Older Adults
Full text linkPurpose: West Virginia (WV) is a rural state of the United States with the third oldest and most inactive population, and the highest prevalence of chronic conditions/disability. Online interventions are needed to reach this population to promote physical activity (PA). The state, however, lags behind the United States in internet/digital device access. This study examined digital device use and the factors that predicted confidence in using technology for online PA.
Methods: An online survey was administered to older WV adults (aged 65+) who were recruited via social media. Data were collected on socio-demographics, chronic conditions, global health, disability, moderate and vigorous-intensity PA minutes, and digital device use. Confidence in using a device for an online PA class was measured from 0 (not confident) to 10 (very confident). Multiple linear regression identified predictors of confidence.
Results: Participants (n = 198) were ‘younger’ older adults (mean 68 years) and primarily married (62%) men (65%) with college degrees (59%) and income over $50,000 USD (61%). Participants were more racially/ethnically diverse with lower arthritis (19%), hypertension (41%), obesity (19%), and disability (14%–27%) prevalence than the older WV population. Seventy percent owned and used a computer, tablet, or smartwatch and had previously taken an online PA class; all had internet access. Between 98%–100% used an application, sent a text/email, or joined a video call within the past month. Mean confidence was 7.4 ± 2.1 (range 0–10). Younger age (coefficient ± standard error) (–0.15 ± 0.04, p < 0.001), no cognitive disability (0.59 ± 0.18, p < 0.001), and greater global physical health (0.08 ± 0.03, p = 0.003) significantly predicted higher confidence, adjusted for vigorous PA.
Conclusion: Internet access, device ownership/use, and confidence were higher than anticipated in rural WV. The predictors were consistent with predictors of internet use in older adults. This younger healthier sample, with modest socioeconomic status, was not representative of older WV adults, most likely due to recruitment via social media. Although the digital divide is narrowing, device ownership/use was not 100%. Online PA is important because it improves cognitive/physical health. Future research should focus on reaching rural ‘older’ older adults with the greatest need (e.g. lower income, worse health/disability) for online PA interventions
Preliminary Cross-Sectional Study About Remote Work and Office Workers’ Health in Catalonia. Sedentary Behaviour, Musculoskeletal Symptoms, Physical Activity, Perceived Fitness, and Quality Of Life
Full text linkBackground: The shift towards remote work, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has significantly transformed the working environment for many office employees. While teleworking offers greater flexibility, it may also lead to increased sedentary behaviour and have implications for musculoskeletal health, physical activity patterns, and perceived wellbeing. This preliminary study aims to explore the relationships between remote work and various health indicators among office workers.
Methods: A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with 275 office workers who engage in remote work at least one day per week, as part of a larger study aiming to recruit 400 participants. The survey included sociodemographic variables, the Standardised Nordic Questionnaire to assess musculoskeletal symptoms, the Global Physical Activity Questionnaire to evaluate physical activity levels and sedentary time, the International Fitness Scale to identify perceived physical fitness, and SF-12v2 to assess the perceived health-related quality of life. Descriptive and inferential analyses were conducted depending on whether the assumptions of the parametric test were met. T-test, Mann–Whitney U, Kruskal–Wallis, and Chi-Square tests were performed to explore the relationship between the presence of musculoskeletal complaints and total minutes/day of physical activity, days/week of telework, and gender.
Results: A total of 63.6% of participants reported neck and shoulder discomfort (mean 4.46 ± 2.17), and 49.2% reported upper and lower back pain (mean 4.62 ± 2.02). Women reported more back pain than men (X2(2, N = 250) = 10,013; p = 0.007). Daily minutes of physical activity were significantly higher among those with better perceived physical fitness [H(4) = 38,615; p < 0.001]. Participants who teleworked more days per week reported more neck and shoulder pain (U = 5,670; p = 0.003), and those with back pain had a more negative perception of their mental health (U = 6,246; p = 0.006).
Conclusion: This preliminary analysis suggests that remote work may be associated with increased sedentary time and a high prevalence of musculoskeletal discomfort. Lower physical activity levels and poorer self-perceived fitness appear to be contributing factors. These findings highlight the importance of promoting physical activity in remote work settings. Public health policies and workplace health promotion strategies should address these challenges to support healthier and more sustainable teleworking environments
S02: Promoting Physical Activity in Healthcare Settings: Physical Activity Referral Schemes and Supporting Guidelines
Full text linkPurpose: This symposium will present evidence, expertise, and experiences from different European countries on the implementation and effectiveness of Physical Activity Referral Schemes (PARS) and the development of relevant guidelines and implementation standards for physical activity promotion.
Description: Promoting physical activity through healthcare professionals is a key strategy for improving population activity levels, as highlighted in the WHO’s Global Action Plan on Physical Activity (GAPPA) and the Physical Activity Strategy for the WHO European Region 2016–2025. PARS are considered a promising approach to integrating physical activity promotion into routine clinical practice.
However, although PARS aim to support sustained behaviour change, evidence of their effectiveness remains mixed, probably due to differences in programme content and delivery, as well as the lack of standardised guidelines. This symposium examines five initiatives that address these challenges.
Evidence from Belgium and Germany highlights the potential of PARS to promote long-term physical activity improvements, with additional gains in psychosocial determinants such as motivation, self-efficacy, and health competences. In the Netherlands, the launch of an online consultation guideline (“Bewust Bewegen”) enables healthcare professionals to integrate brief, evidence-based physical activity advice into daily practice. Another German initiative focuses on developing practical, interdisciplinary guidelines for the promotion of physical activity in rehabilitation settings, ensuring alignment with real-world clinical needs. Finally, Scotland’s national evaluation of its PARS standards shows high adoption of behaviour change principles, but also identifies barriers to routine data collection that limit robust outcome evaluation.
Conclusion: These contributions demonstrate that PARS and related guidelines can effectively support the promotion of physical activity within healthcare systems. However, their long-term success depends on sustained implementation efforts, professional support, and standardised approaches to monitoring and evaluation. By sharing lessons learned across countries, this symposium offers valuable insights into how healthcare systems can better embed physical activity promotion into practice to improve patient outcomes and public health
S02-1: Online Consultation Guidelines ‘Bewust Bewegen’ With Chronic Diseases
Full text linkPurpose: The primary purpose of the online consultation guidelines is to support health care professionals in providing a very brief and evidence based advice on physical activity to patients with the most common chronic diseases. Hence, making it easier for healthcare professionals to integrate physical activity promotion into regular care.
Project. Development: The consultation guidelines “Bewust Bewegen” were developed by the Knowledge Centre for Sports and Physical Activity in the Netherlands, in collaboration with Moving Medicine, an initiative from the Faculty of Sport and Exercise Medicine (United Kingdom). The guidelines are developed to meet the needs of healthcare professionals with limited time for lifestyle/physical activity counselling.
The developmental process was guided by scientific evidence, and input and feedback from scientific as well as healthcare professionals, including doctors, physical therapists, nurses etc. was incorporated. “Bewust Bewegen” was launched in March 2024.
Implementation: “Bewust Bewegen” is a free online tool. The tool provides structured consultation guides for very brief (1 minute) and brief (5 minute) conversations and in-depth background information about mechanism, advice, contra-indications, and referral options.
Evaluation: Both qualitative and quantitative data is collected. For example, all users receive an evaluation form three months after registration to gather insights on their experiences, such as information for which goals they use the guidelines, how they rate the guidelines, and which information is missed. From launch to January 2025, 555 professionals have used the online consultation guidelines. In total 36 professionals have completed the evaluation form. The overall score for the online consultations is 7.8 (scale 1–10), and is mostly used in consultation or in preparation for the consultation.
Dissemination: The dissemination primarily occurs through healthcare professional associations, both online and offline. In addition, the guidelines are promoted via newsletters, articles, conferences, and podcasts.
Conclusion: “Bewust Bewegen” aims to help healthcare professionals in the Netherlands to conduct a ‘very brief advice’ consultation about physical activity for people with various chronic conditions and provides information about the specific advice, referral options, and contraindications. Considering the results from the evaluation so far, it seems likely that the concept of very brief advice appeals to healthcare professionals
S04: Back to a Healthy Society (BASE): Reconnecting and Enhancing Healthy Living in Socially Isolated Older Adults Through a Peer-To-Peer Change Agent Approach
Full text linkDuring and in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis older people presented significantly reduced practice of physical activity and social contact and were exposed to several psychological stress factors that negatively affected physical and mental health. To change this for the better, the Erasmus+ project ‘Back to a Healthy Society’ (BASE) was developed.
The BASE project aimed to reconnect older adults to society through engaging them in low profile regular physical and social activities. For that a peer-to-peer change-agent approach was designed and applied, in which trained sport and/or health professionals trained older volunteers/peers. These active older volunteers became so-called Neighbourhood Buddies who organised, assisted, and facilitated easily accessible physical and social activities in their neighbourhood to reintegrate and empower older adults who have not been as active so far. Eight partners from six EU countries (DE, NL, PT, MK, LT, ES) exploited a two-step activation process in four local communities (Malaga, Drenthe, Skopje, and Kaunas).
a) Active older volunteers are trained as Neighbourhood Buddies for Healthy Lifestyle so that they could empower their older inactive and often socially isolated peers. For their training, a holistic concept of healthy lifestyle was developed to trigger behavioural change and activation.
b) The local change agents were supported by qualified mentors who form part of the local community ecosystem as sport professionals. The mentors were trained to exploit a local community of practice approach to support developing an active neighbourhood setting. They assisted the Neighbourhood Buddies in co-creating applicable and innovative healthy lifestyle initiatives and to anchor them with local community stakeholders across sectors. From there, reaching out to nearby communities was promoted to extend the impact.
This practice oriented symposium will contain four presentations covering the following topics:
1. Background and foundation of the BASE programme (Johan de Jong);
2. The co-creation process and structure of the peer-to-peer change agent approach of BASE (Matthias Guett & Harold Hofenk);
3. Results, impact, and learnings of the BASE project in local communities in Spain, Macedonia, Lithuania, and the Netherlands (Iván López-Fernández);
4. Sustainability and future initiatives of BASE (Matthias Guett & Marco Clemente).
Acknowledgement: The Erasmus+ BASE project was co-funded by the European Union.
Keywords: Older adults, healthy lifestyle, healthy living, peer-to-peer, community-based, social chang
S08: Physical Activity Policy Monitoring at the National and Sub-National Levels: From Tools Development to Their Real-World Impact
Full text linkInsufficient physical activity (PA) in the population is a growing global health problem, with nearly one-third (31%) of adults worldwide not meeting the recommended levels of PA in 2022, compared with 23% in the year 2000. Policies have been identified as systemic determinants of PA opportunities and, eventually, changes in PA behaviour in populations. Following guidance from international and scientific organisations, national and sub-national governments have developed and enacted their own policy initiatives to tackle the inactivity epidemic and support more active environments, societies, and individuals. However, in most cases these initiatives are not (properly) monitored and evaluated, and their actual population impact remains largely undocumented.
This symposium addresses this problem by presenting studies analysing PA policy monitoring tools at national and sub-national levels. The presentations cover various perspectives, including the development, implementation, and potential impact of these tools, as well as their strengths and limitations.
The first presentation will provide a mapping of national level PA policy monitoring tools and explore the potential impact of these tools on the policy process. The second presentation will summarise the results of a grey literature review of sub-national level PA policy monitoring tools developed by governments and researchers. The third presentation will explore the process and outcomes of developing and pilot testing a PA monitoring tool in co-production with the government, while the fourth one will focus on PA monitoring at the local level in different settings (e.g. municipality and school), combined with other health themes such as nutrition, mental wellbeing, fall prevention, and smoking.
Discussions will include the feasibility of government led, ongoing PA policy monitoring using the tools developed by academics, the audience’s experience related to PA policy monitoring/evaluation, but also how to streamline the efforts to promote and support the institutionalisation of policy monitoring/evaluation and the use of monitoring data for policy improvement and increases in population’s PA behaviour
S09-3: Global Observatory for Physical Education (GoPE!): Launching the First Set of Country Cards
Full text linkPurpose: To present the global landscape of physical education (PE) and school-based physical activity (PA) from the First set of Global Observatory for Physical Education (GoPE!) Country Cards.
Methods: Data were collected for 218 countries on country demographics, PA participation, PE policy, PE surveillance, and PE and school-based PA interventions research. The most recent available data from the World Health Organization (WHO), World Bank, UNESCO, governmental websites, monitoring systems, Google, and scientific databases informed the indicators. Moreover, a systematic umbrella review was conducted. The data for the indicators were collected following a standardised research protocol created by the GoPE! Research Group and validated by the Country Contacts from the GoPE! worldwide network of experts.
Results: Preliminary results indicate that the GoPE! Country Contacts network consists of 215 members, representing 164 (75.2%) out of 218 countries. The coverage per WHO region is as follows: SEARO (90.9%), EURO (85.5%), WPRO (78.1%), AFRO (74.5%), EMRO (72.7%), and PAHO (56.8%). Currently, GoPE! country representatives confirmed and approved data for 124 countries (56.9%) out of 218 countries. Within these 124 countries, 86.3% had a national official PE curriculum for all compulsory school years of primary education and 80.65% for all compulsory school years of secondary education. In 83.9% and 72.6% of those 124 countries, there was a national policy requiring mandatory PE for all compulsory school years of primary education and secondary education, respectively. A national policy requiring minimum and mandatory PE time existed in 53.2% and 50.8% of those countries for all compulsory school years of primary education and secondary education, respectively. Moreover, a total of 6.5% of the countries presented PE policies ruled at the subnational level. Finally, 34.7% of the 124 countries had national surveillance systems aimed at evaluating PE policies’ implementation, and 38.7% of the countries had research articles on PE and school-based PA intervention.
Conclusions: The GoPE! Country Cards will provide stakeholders with a powerful tool to assess and enhance the policies, surveillance systems, and research related to PE and school-based PA participation in their countries.
Support/Funding Source: Global Observatory for Physical Activity (GoPA!)
S16-2: Understanding Physical Activity Provision in Mental Health Services in Ireland
Full text linkPurpose: Exercise is a robustly evidenced adjunct therapeutic for people accessing specialist mental health services. However, anecdotal accounts from the Irish context point to ad-hoc service provision, notwithstanding some examples of service innovation with respect to physical activity provision. The purpose of this work is: A. to describe the nature and scope of physical activity provision in Irish mental health services, in addition to the barriers and facilitators of exercise provision as described by service providers; B. to undertake an implementation focused case study of a novel pilot project where two Integrated Exercise Practitioners have been embedded into the mental health services. This case study seeks to document the Exercise Practitioner role, assess perceived effectiveness, and explore implementation to date.
Methods: A mixed method, two-phased approach was undertaken. Phase 1 employed a national cross-sectional online survey evaluation. Here, participants were multi-disciplinary mental health services staff from the Republic of Ireland with knowledge regarding exercise provision in their service. Phase 2 was a descriptive qualitative case study of ‘physical activity service innovation’, framed by the RE-AIM framework, and aligned to the CFIR implementation science framework. Phase 2 participants included ‘integrated exercise practitioners’ or ‘management’ from the partner community based organisation, supported by policy and document analysis.
Results: The survey evaluation included service providers (n = 45) from varying roles from different service types across Ireland. Almost 90% of respondents reported offering ‘some physical activity programmes within their services’. More than half cited mental health benefits as the main rationale for provision. Only 25% of respondents felt their programmes met service user needs; 67% of respondents referred their users to external programmes. Qualitative inquiry in the Phase 2 case study offers perceived reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation, and maintenance insight into the integration of exercise practitioners in mental health services in Ireland.
Conclusion: This work suggests there is urgent need to advance the standardisation of therapeutic physical activity provision in many mental health service contexts. We further offer implementation and scaling insight for the development of integrated exercise practitioners in mental health in the Irish context.
Support/Funding Source: Co-funded by: Mental Health Ireland and The South East Technological University
S17-2: Physical Education for a Sustainable Future: Merging Health Promotion Through Physical Literacy With Global Environmental Responsibility
Full text linkPurpose: This study explores how the integration of holistic health frameworks (One Health, EcoHealth, and Planetary Health) can reshape the mission of physical education (PE) by aligning it with both health promotion and environmental responsibility. In doing so, it redefines physical literacy (PL) as a foundation for developing sustainable, active lifestyles within ecological limits.
Methods: A critical narrative synthesis of interdisciplinary literature, policy documents (e.g. UNESCO, World Health Organization), and educational models was conducted to examine the intersections between physical literacy, health education, and sustainable development. Secondly, an analysis of conceptual shifts in the definition of health and their influence on PE’s pedagogical goals and practices was carried out, using comparative matrices to identify the impacts of the three health frameworks on the four dimensions of PL: physical, cognitive, psychological, and social.
Results: Our findings show that reorienting PE through Planetary Health promotes physical activities that reduce carbon emissions and raise awareness of planetary boundaries. EcoHealth emphasises embodied and empathetic connections to ecosystems through nature-based activities and community engagement, while One Health prioritises cross-sectoral health practices to prevent zoonotic diseases. Each model reconfigures the development of PL by embedding health education within environmental and social systems thinking, offering distinct yet complementary pedagogical strategies. The article also presents real-world examples (e.g. mountain biking in deprived areas) that operationalise these theoretical models, illustrating the feasibility of PE interventions grounded in PL for sustainability.
Conclusions: A reconceptualisation of health in PE, one that acknowledges ecological interdependence, is necessary to address the intertwined crises of physical inactivity and environmental degradation. PL offers a unifying, adaptable framework through which PE can contribute meaningfully to holistic health and sustainability. Adopting context-sensitive health models in PE supports the development of environmentally aware, physically literate citizens committed to active and sustainable lifestyles.
Support/Funding Source: This research received no external funding from commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Keywords: Physical literacy, health education, sustainability, planetary health, physical educatio
Two Decades of HEPA Europe: Advancing Physical Activity Promotion Across the European Region
Full text linkBackground: The Health-Enhancing Physical Activity (HEPA) Europe network was established in 2005 to promote physical activity (PA) related research, policy, and practice across the World Health Organization (WHO) European Region. It was founded on early recognition of the essential role of regular PA for health, contributing to the prevention of non-communicable diseases and the promotion of mental, physical, and social wellbeing but before related European policy frameworks emerged.
Nature of the Network: Formally launched under the auspices of the WHO Regional Office for Europe (WHO/Europe), HEPA Europe has grown into a multidisciplinary and cross-sectoral network of over 250 member institutions from 41 WHO European member states. These include governmental bodies, academic institutions, and non-governmental organisations working in fields such as PA, sport, health, education, urban planning, and transport. The network supports collaboration through working groups, an annual conference, and meetings that facilitate the exchange of knowledge, best practices, consortia building for European Union (EU) funded projects, and policy development. It provides tools and evidence for policy and practice to address the insufficient levels of PA and increasing sedentary behaviour across the WHO European Region.
Recent Developments: In the recent years, HEPA Europe has strengthened its position by creating an early career development section to support young scientists and professionals at the beginning of their careers in the field of PA promotion. In addition, HEPA Europe worked actively to collaborate with the EU PA Focal Points network, created in 2014, to support implementation of the HEPA Monitoring Framework, established to monitor the implementation of the EU PA Guidelines. HEPA Europe must broaden engagement across sectors and regions, improve sustainability, and strengthen the research–policy–practice link to maintain its impact.
Keywords: Network, exercise, public health, governanc