Objective: To investigate whether signs encouraging taking the stairs or discouraging taking the elevator lead to an increasing number of patients taking the stairs instead of the elevator in a hospital.
Design: Interventional study.
Method: During a period of 6 weeks in the period October-December 2004, an investigator recorded how many patients took the stairs and how many took the elevator on the first floor of a hospital close to a diabetes outpatient clinic. A baseline measurement was done over a period of 2 weeks and 4 weeks were used for evaluating the effect of 2 different interventions, each lasting 2 weeks. During the first intervention, a sign was hung up near the elevator, which read: 'Exercise is healthy, take the stairs'. During the second intervention the sign read: 'Use of this elevator is exclusively for personnel and persons with restricted mobility'. Staff members and disabled patients were excluded from the study.
Results: A total of 2674 movements were counted. Use of the stairs increased statistically significantly during both interventions: from 54.6% to 63.4% during the first intervention and to 70.4% during the second intervention.
Conclusion: Signs in a diabetes outpatient clinic that either encouraged the use of the stairs or discouraged the use of the elevator increased the patients' use of the stairs.