Posture on the Job

The term desk-bound describes how a significant portion of people spend their 8 hour working days in the 21st century. Many people come into our office complaining of daily headaches and it has become clear that these two situations are not mutually exclusive: a day at the office can cause a headache in more ways than one. Consider one of the simplest explanations of all: your posture in front of the screen.

How many people can truly hold their head up high and say that they have perfect posture at work or that they regularly take breaks to stretch, move and hydrate? If you are one of these people, we applaud you and your back thanks you. But for many people, posture is not an easy proposition: spending long windows of time in front of the screen tends to lull people into a hunched forward position, where their head is leaned toward the screen and their back is rounded. As they work away, muscles in the neck and shoulders are being asked to compensate and support the weight of the head which is no longer balanced above the spine. Tensing and muscle strain ensue which can quickly lead to muscle spasms which will refer the pain to nerves in the head. 

This may not be the sole contributing factor to your headache, but fixing your posture can go a long way to influencing a myriad of conditions that are backs and heads suffer from on a daily basis. Call our office in Sacramento to find out the small things you can change to make a positive impact on your headaches: we can be reached at (916) 457-8825.

Dr. Raymond Espinosa, D.C.