— Dr. Alka Gyawali, Physiotherapist

In this competitive age, everyone is busy with their work either at our office, hospital or banks. Nobody is concerned about their health and the health related issues that could arise as a result of poor working environment and handling habits. We are always focused on perfection that we tend to occupy ourselves for long 7-8 hours without a sound break in work and postures. Yes, working is essential to sustain our livelihood but working in a poor posture and environment continuously for long time can result in several musculoskeletal injuries.

There are two basic injuries – acute and chronic. Acute injury is due to strong and short term heavy loads whereas chronic injury results from long term or permanent overload. Based on the cases I have been receiving, the most common work related musculoskeletal injuries includes: mechanical low back pain, rhomboids and trapezius strain, cervical and para-vertebral muscle spasms, trigger points, carpel tunnel syndrome, cervical and lumbar spine degenerative conditions, tennis elbow, tendinitis, hip and knee injuries, etc.

The risks factors contributing to these injuries could be exertion of high intensity forces, handling loads for long period of time and monotonous repetitive activities. Furthermore, working on unfavorable posture, long term muscular strain, poorly designed workstation and psychological factors like increased work stress could equally be responsible for.

How can we avoid these problems?

Ergonomic and workstation modification are the keys to getting rid of all these work related problems. Understanding ergonomics helps us prevent pain or injury and create an appropriate balance between the requirements of the work and capacity of the working person.

Some of the important ergonomic advice:

1. Lift with both hands bringing load as close as possible to the body.
2. Lift heavy loads with an upright trunk by initially bending knees and avoiding manipulation of loads in unfavorable postures (e.g. lateral bending or twisting.)
3. Avoid pushing or pulling with only one hand.
4. Avoid pushing or pulling with strong lateral bending or twisted trunk.
5. If our work demands us to sit in front of a computer for a long 7-8 hours. The tips for good posture and work station modification include siting on a high back chair to support our shoulder blades; adjusting the chair height to get the thigh parallel to the floor and feet to rest flat on the floor; and setting the monitor or laptop screen at the eye level. If the laptop or monitor screen is not at the eye level, we can use a document holder or pile of books to adjust the height accordingly. This will save us from over bending and over stretching. Also, resting the elbows on the arm rest at a 90-degree angle, maintaining the wrist in a neutral position while using mouse, keyboard etc. and keeping everything that we need in official work close by or within easy reach because repeatedly reaching out for things while being seated at our workstation can strain our muscles. The tips also include that the seating height should be adequately adjusted i.e. keeping our body at a 90-degree angle to our thighs to keep our spine aligned.
6. Change the body posture frequently in order to reduce continuous static loading.
7. Take a break or pause for about 20-25 minutes between the process.

How much do we know?

1. Working in an improper posture for consecutive hours can lead to micro trauma in the body. The postural muscles supporting joints and structures in the body gets weakened over time so standing up time to time from a long sitting job is essential.
2. Keeping wallet in the back pocket disturbs our posture, puts pressure on our spine and causes it to be out of alignment. It can also put pressure on Piriformis muscle which aggravates the sciatic nerve and can lead to sciatica.
3. Carrying handbags which include heavy contents like laptops, ipads, water bottles, etc on one shoulder leads to neck pain, shoulder pain as well as headaches.
4. Wearing high heels for a long time can create an unnatural posture through the spine which can lead to long term pain and dysfunction.
5. Sitting with our leg over our knee for long periods of time can cause our pelvis to rotate and tilt and ultimately lead to low back pain.
6. Talking on the phone for a long time with the gadget held between our ear and neck while we are working can cause neck muscles to become strained.
7. Sitting on a stool or chair that is too high causes our legs to hang which tilts our pelvis backward and disturbs muscular balance such that our core muscles have to compensate in certain extent which can cause pain.
8. Continuously looking at mobile phones, iPads or laptops can lead to development of slouch posture. That puts more pressure on discs and vertebrae of our back.