We live in a time where everything moves fast, and we don’t have enough time to think about our physical health, and this is not likely to change any time soon. People generally turn to a physiotherapist for advice when they experience pain, not just for consultation on improving their lifestyle and preventing issues.
Some of the most common reasons for a visiting a Physio are injury, surgery recovery and trauma, but there are other reasons we can affect on our own to prevent them from happening in the first place.
Physiotherapy and its benefits
Physiotherapy is not just for sports injuries, as many people believe. People of all ages and activity levels are visiting a Physio for treatment and the prevention of musculoskeletal conditions. A Physiotherapist can, of course, help recover from surgery, treat trauma or manage chronic conditions.
However, there are issues that modern-day jobs create daily, leaving a mark on our bodies without us even knowing until we experience pain. These issues are mainly related to sitting for a long time and working with bad posture. In these cases, preventive exercises can be most beneficial to help the body recover faster and feed every muscle properly.
Visiting a Physio – problems we can prevent
In this article, we wanted to turn our attention to the issues that we can help prevent on our own with some exercises and simply changing our sedentary lifestyle for a certain degree.
Lower back pain – the most common problem
The problem occurs due to sitting for a long time, primarily while working, using our PC/laptop, and driving. A pain that originates in the lower back and starts to move down the leg. The issue starts because of how we sit while we work.
In that position, we usually bend forward, putting all the weight on that part of the body. The muscles lose strength, and all the weight transfers to our tendons and nerves. That is when an inflammatory process occurs, and pain starts. Switching the position we sit in, and maybe using a Yogi ball to sit on once in a while, will help reduce the chance for pain and inflamation.
Neck pain – the Cervical syndrome
This issue happens because of how we sit, or in other words bend, while we work and the pressure we put on the spine, but this time – in the neck region. Also, after some time, a complication such as Cervico cephalgia may occur, where the pain starts moving towards the head due to a long-term bad posture and neck bending with no preventive exercises to relieve the neck region of pain and regenerate the muscles.
There is also the Cervico brachial syndrome, where the pain will move the other way – towards the arm, and the pain may be excruciating since up to three nerves can be inflamed simultaneously. Sitting for 12 hours a day is not a good idea in the long run if you do not exercise and give your muscles time to recover.
Shoulder region
The problems generally start because of overuse of the shoulders, but there are other ways for this injury to occur.
The main reasons are the repeated movement of the arm, or locking the shoulder in one position when it is under presure, while bending our upper back. For instance, we have cooks who stir for a long time or movers who bend in the same position to carry. The other good example is people who work in front of a PC for a long time. The position of the arms is stretched forward, putting all the weight on the shoulders, and in that position, the biggest hit is taken by the tendons and nerves in the shoulder region.
The upper back and shoulder blades will be the main pain point.
Unlocking your shoulders from that position should be the best way to go, and stretching them from time to time, gives the arms and the shoulder muscles time to recover and to get their food.
Hip pain
One of the main reasons for this type of pain – is inactivity. Lack of movement and sitting in the same position for a long time must be avoided. Also, crossing your legs makes the body sit in a bad position, bending the back to one side, and also puts a lot of pressure from the weight of our body to one side.
To prevent this, of course, the best thing you can do is take a walk every now and then. The hips need to “rest”, even if that doesn’t sound like resting in this case, every change will be beneficial for your body.
Prevention
So far, we have tried focusing on issues that we can affect by ourselves and not let them happen in the first place. Prevention with exercises, walking, and some simple stretching will help our body regenerate during the day, making “feeding” every part of itself easier. Also, make sure not to bend forward too much or sit only on one side. Changing positions often and switching the chair for a ball sometimes will help.
If you want to check out some stretching exercises, you may find them on this link.
We hope this helps shed some light on how bad posture and low activity levels affect our bodies. Changing your lifestyle from a sedentary one to a more active one could be challenging, but it doesn’t have to be.
Eudaemonio has personalized plans with short and precise preventative exercises that can be done even by your desk. If you would like to learn more about that – you may visit this link.
