Tag Archives: prevent back pain

Back Pain at Work, Best Exercise

5 Tips to Relieve Back Pain

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5 back pain tipsBack pain, lower back pain and sciatica are some of the biggest concerns of employers, as they keep millions of people off work every day around the globe. In fact most adults will suffer some type of back pain at some point during their lives.

If you suffer from back pain, you may not realize it but you can alleviate a lot of the pain yourself easily. Even if you have received, or are currently receiving treatment, you can still help your recovery along with these 5 simple steps.

Tip 1
prevent back painDistribute your weight evenly. When standing, don’t put your weight more on one leg than the other, as you would normally when standing with a hand on one hip for example. Also if you must carry anything for any considerable length of time, choose a backpack style bag, rather than a shoulder bag. And wear it properly! How many times have you seen backpacks thrown over one shoulder? It completely defeats the purpose! You can buy lots of purses and handbags that come in the backpack style – you don’t have to look like you’re going camping.

Tip 2
Relax! I learned this one when learning to drive. Often, I was so anxious, my shoulders were almost up to my ears! And I wondered why my back pain was worse than ever, when driving. Relax your whole body, and move in a fluid, rather than a ridged way. You may have to remind yourself to lower your shoulders, but once you get used to it, you will be able to do it automatically.

Tip 3
Improve your posture. Some people will think that this tip contradicts the last one, but you can still maintain good posture, while staying relaxed. It is when we are sitting that we tend to slump, and adopt poor posture. But a lot of chairs do not help either. Make sure your chair has a full back to it, and if it is not an ergonomic chair, add a cushion or lumbar support to keep your lower spine in the correct position. Keep your shoulders back and your head straight. You should also have your thighs parallel to the floor and your feet flat on the floor, or on a foot rest.

Tip 4
Keep hydrated. Drink plenty of water in order to keep your muscles hydrated. Hydrated muscles are happy muscles because they are more flexible and stretchy, and less likely to go into spasm or get pulled or damaged.

Tip 5
Do gentle cardiovascular exercise as often as possible. Walking for around 20 minutes is the best type of low impact cardio exercise, as it is easy to incorporate into your day, and still gets the heart pumping. It gets you moving and warms up the back muscles, and if you walk slightly faster than you would normally, you will breathe better, which gets oxygenated blood to your muscles too. In fact you can still achieve this from walking at your normal pace, and simply breathing deeply.

Try using these tips regularly and you should notice a reduction in your pain. The most important thing is consistency and organization.

photo by cambodia4kidsorg

Back Pain at Work, Best Exercise, Sitting

Top 10 Ways To Prevent Back Pain When Sitting

Top 10 back pain tips when sittingSome employers are waking up to the fact that their employees need to be kept comfortable while working, in order to reduce the number of sickness days due to chronic pain; most notably Back Pain.

The Oman Observer reports that staff at Omantel are being asked “Are You Sitting Comfortably?” as part of a new campaign to reduce the number of back pain incidents and promote better posture so that they look after their backs and stay healthy.
The Omantel Human Resources Unit know that encouraging people to sit properly with the correct posture was vital in acheiving better health and safety standards at work.

Employees are also being given individual questionnaires that help them judge if their backs are healthy and give them practical advice on what to do to make sure their backs stay pain free and injury free. See the full story Here.

More companies need to follow suit. It’s fine to provide them with ergonomic chairs, but many people don’t sit correctly in them, or make the biggest mistake of all; they stay in the same position for too long.

It’s essential to change position regularly, and to stretch and exercise while sitting down for long periods of time. You can achieve this by doing the following exercises; all of which can be done while sitting:

  • Shoulder rolls
  • Shoulders up (for two seconds at a time)
  • Head rolls
  • Arm Stretches
  • Elbow rolls (similar to the funky chicken, but circular)
  • Buttock clenches
  • Thigh clenches
  • Back stretch (arms back, arch the back and face the ceiling – ONLY for a few seconds)
  • Hand stretches (spread the finger out, together with regular making of fists – NO punching people!!)
  • Abdominal clenches  (while rolling your back forward for a few seconds – chin on chest)

posture at workDo these every 20 minutes if possible. No fewer than every 60 minutes. You might want to TELL people beforehand, so they understand what you are doing! In fact why not do a presentation on this for everyone to use?

Some companies don’t even supply their staff with ergonomic chairs, which is a FALSE economy, when they end up losing their staff to back problems.

My personal favorite ergonomic chair is the Kinnarps PLUS 6000 series, and it MUST have arm rests. See one Here. They come in hundreds of different colors and fabrics. And they’re very solid and durable. I have had mine since 2003 and it’s still going strong.

But the best advice to reduce back pain when sitting is to move about when on your breaks. So many people just continue to sit at their desks and look at their emails, or browse the internet. Get up and go for a walk, even if only for five minutes, and it will make all the difference to your back.