Calling all office workers! Are you spending most of your day sitting in a chair? Maybe your back starts to ache or your neck gets sore. If you’re slouching and uncomfortable while trying to concentrate on tasks, it might be time to reconsider how exactly you are positioning yourself. Poor desk posture can cause chronic stiffness, neck pain and other issues. With a few adjustments to your desk and chair, as well as improving your posture habits, you can make sure that your days are healthy and comfortable.
If you work in an office, you may be sitting at your desk for hours, focused on your work. After being sedentary for a while, you may notice back pain, as well as neck and shoulder discomfort. This could be due to having poor posture the entire time you were sitting. The optimal sitting position at the desk plays an important role in your overall physical well-being. Of course, it can be more comfortable in the short term to simply slouch but that can also deteriorate your posture. In the long term, poor seating position can change the natural posture of the body. Which allows your body to grow accustomed to incorrect alignment and makes it more difficult to maintain good posture. Leading to health issues such as pain, discomfort, impaired blood circulation and breathing, as well as muscle weakness. So, it is important to sit properly early on so that your body does not get into the bad habit of poor posture while sitting.
To sit properly and maintain good posture there are a few things you may want to consider. The first thing you may want to do is adjust your chair height. You should be sitting with your feet flat on the floor and your knees bent at a right angle. You should also make sure your lumbar support is supporting your lower back in a way that you maintain a natural curve. Make sure you are sitting as far back in the chair as possible and that your arms rests are adjusted to rest your arms. You also want to make sure that the position of your computer screens is at eye level. You should avoid having to tilt your head up or down to look at the screen. Lastly, you want to make sure that your desk is at the height where you can set your forearms parallel to the ground, and your elbows are at 90 degrees.
Once everything at your desk is adjusted to your liking, you should be able to properly sit at your desk. Make sure you are conscious of yourself slipping into a slouched position and correct it. It may not feel natural at first but making these corrections will improve sitting posture at work.
For more information on how to sit correctly at your desk, click here.
Article written by William Graves.