We live in an increasingly digital world and use our laptops, tablets and mobile phones more and more and the recent pandemic increased home use even further.
Many other home activities with repetitive unaccustomed movements also increased over the pandemic such as reading, knitting, learning to play a musical instrument or painting. And while doing these activities the posture was perhaps not optimal.
We all know that good posture is important, but why exactly is it important? We are bombarded with products, exercises, advice and even apps to improve our posture, but what damage can bad posture cause?
Bad posture can:
- Cause unnecessary loading on the body. This affects both the bones, joints, ligaments and muscles. And bad posture can cause pain, disability and deformity in the future.
- Cause reduced respiratory efforts. A slouched posture means you cannot expand your ribcage and lungs adequately.
- Cause problems with your balance. Subsequently you are more likely to fall and injure yourself.
- Make you look shorter. Well, obviously standing tall can give you a much healthier appearance and your actual height is increased.
- Reduce your blood flow.
- Give you headaches.
The picture above illustrates the loading on the junction between the neck vertebrae and the thoracic spine. The weight of the human head is approximately 5 kilos. So, when you are looking into a screen/book or person directly in front of you, there is a 5-kilo loading on your spine. This loading changes drastically as soon as you bend your head forwards just by 15 degrees. The load going through the back of your neck has now increased to a 12-kilo load. A head bend of 30 degrees changes this to 18 kilos, and the full chin on your chest posture loads the junction between your neck and your thoracic spine with 27 kilos.
Those poor postural muscles, joints and bones!!! The problem is not the head position as such, but rather the extended time we sit or stand in these postures. Prolonged poor posture with increased loading of these areas is a problem waiting to happen.
How to avoid bad posture:
- If you do work from home, make sure your laptop is in front of you, preferably elevated up onto some blocks so that you look straight ahead into the screen. You can buy a wireless keyboard and mouse to ensure optimal posture.
- Strengthen your back muscles and keep flexible.
- Use an actual desk with an adjustable chair instead of your lap.
- Ensure regular breaks. You should ideally have a break every 20 minutes to just stretch or stand up during any prolonged sedentary activity.
- Limit time on tablets/phones.
- Don’t overfill the shopping bags. Walk a few times from car to the house to avoid excess loading. Also limit what you carry in your handbag or use a backpack/rucksack instead of a shoulder bag.
- Take time to de-stress, unwind and relax.
