It's the end of another
long day at work. You drag yourself to the car and fight your way through
traffic to your house. Once you get inside, you wonder how you can have such a
massive back ache - after all, you've been sitting at a desk all day, not
lifting heavy boxes. Did it ever occur to you your chair may be the problem?
Source: HEALTH
AND WELLNESS BLOG INDIA
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| Better Sitting Posture Better Back |
Posture and Your Back
When you were growing up, you learned to turn a deaf ear to
your mother and her harping on your posture. If you had a nickel for every time
she told you to sit up straight and not slump, you'd be sitting pretty right
now. Now that you're grown, you've learned being young equates to being stupid,
and you're forced to admit your mother was right more often than she was wrong.
News flash: she was right about your posture, too. Improper sitting posture is a
prime gateway to chronic back pain. In our technology-driven society, every
white collar worker has a computer on their desk. Most office desks were not
designed for proper computer posture; the average office worker sits at a
forty-five degree angle while working at the computer. If not forty-five
degrees, at least fifteen to twenty degrees. Computer work leads to
head-forward posture and slumped, forward-posturing shoulders. Poor posture
leads to muscles spasms,
trigger points, muscle tension migraines, and chronic back pain.
Ergonomics
Office furniture is supposedly designed for optimum
efficiency during an eight-hour workday. When most office furniture designs
were made, computers weren't even a science-fiction idea yet; desks and chairs
were designed for paper work, and had extensions for typewriters. The
extensions were the proper height for a worker to turn from their desk to the
typewriter without having to adjust the chair height, and the keyboard was at
the proper level to reduce shoulder strain. Secretarial desks are still
designed this way; the typewriter has been replaced by the computer, but the
ergonomics still work. Where they don't work is the white collar worker's desk.
These desks and chairs are designed for paper work and nothing else. The advent
of technology has ushered in the era of a computer on every desk; the result is
less area for paper work, causing posture problems as the worker hunches over
the paper and works around the keyboard. The height of the desk is not the
proper height for someone to work at a keyboard and maintain proper posture;
this leads to slumped shoulders, forward head posture, forward-leaning sitting
posture and all the attendant problems they bring. The only office chair
designed for computer work is the Balans chair - the kneeling chair. A Balans
chair tilts the torso slightly forward and puts the weight on the knees. This
ensures the spine is kept in its normal S-shaped posture, and eliminates the
leaning-forward posture common to regular office chairs.
Posture and Chronic
Back Pain
Years of poor posture lead to chronic back pain; as you lean
forward to work at your computer on a desk never designed for it, you stress
your muscles, especially around your head, neck, and shoulders. You also place
stress on your lower lumbar muscles; basically you call on your lower back to
support the entire weight of your head, neck and shoulders, instead of your
whole back carrying the load. These stressed muscles become inflamed; tissue
becomes irritated, and the stress placed on your spinal column will eventually
lead to the development of osteoarthritis. This
is a heavy price to pay for something relatively inexpensive to correct.
What Do You Do?
Use of a properly designed desk and chair will eliminate the
vast majority of poor posture incidences in the American work force. If your
employer is not willing to pay for secretarial desks and Balans chairs for his
entire office staff, you need to correct the effects of your ergonomics. Get up
and walk around at least once an hour. Do stretching exercises regularly, even
at your desk. There are Yoga exercises for the head, neck, and shoulder that
are easy to do while sitting, and they can reduce the strain on the affected
muscles. Pay for a Balans chair yourself - it's between $100.00 and $500.00,
well worth the money. When you leave work, do exercises when you get home, to
strengthen your lower back muscles, and relieve the strain on the muscles of
your head, neck, and shoulders. Take responsibility for your back, and
counteract the effects of your poor sitting posture as best you can.
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| Chronic Back Pain |
Health Blog URL: http://blog.edtreatmentindia.com/
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