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CHENNAI: A sedentary lifestyle has led to an increase in the time spent sitting during work hours, travel and at home. Sitting for a long time every day is injurious to health, with increased risk of diabetes, heart diseases, depression and cancer.
An average person with a desk job spends at least eight to 10 hours sitting in a day. Back or neck pain is one of the most common symptoms experienced by them. Prolonged sitting affects the muscles, ligaments, discs and joints of the spine. Inactivity tends to weaken the spinal, abdominal and gluteal muscles, reducing the core strength. Hip flexors and hamstring muscles become shortened and lead to stiffness and thereby increase the strain on the lower back.
A bad posture, such as slouching forwards or hunching, sliding to the edge of the chair and leaning back too much, bending the neck to look down or up while looking at the computer screen — leads to chronic repetitive overstrain on the trunk muscles and spine. The lumbar discs are subjected to high pressures in a bad posture. This may lead to accelerated degeneration of the discs leading to increased risk of disc prolapse.
Prolonged use of mobile phones is usually associated with forward flexion of the neck. This is one of the leading causes of upper back, neck and shoulder pain. Weight gain is an eventual outcome of sedentary lifestyle and it also strains the spine and increases the risk of developing chronic back pain. So, if you spend hours sitting and suffer from chronic back or neck pain, then the following measures will help you get better or prevent spinal pain:
(The writer is a senior consultant spine surgeon, Institute of Advanced Spine Sciences, Gleneagles Global Health City )