Is your work a pain?

Although only a few of us are lucky enough to really love work most of us fall into a love hate relationship which changes with the work and often our fellow workers.

Getting the right  work environment is often a bit of a challenge and sometimes we all succumb to the “pressure of work” and and its resultant misery. These days with “hot desking” and people moving between different offices finding a comfortable and efficient position to work is something we all have to be responsible for.

Certainly one size does not fit all but we all do have to find away of adjusting the various standard sized furniture to fit our various sizes and needs.

Ideally it is best to start with adjusting the office chair to suit your dimensions so that when comfortable your feet are just flat on the ground. Unfortunately,  in most situations as the desk is of fixed height it is best to get yourself in the right position relative to the desk and tools of the trade for the task and then if the correct position of the seat relative to this means your feet do not meet the ground,  you bring the ground up to you with some kind of foot rest.

Once you can grasp this concept the rest is relatively straight forward. The idea is that when you are comfortably – but alertly sat at your desk with your eyes level with the top of your computer screen your keyboard should be in such a position that your shoulders are happy being relaxed and down, your wrists are just slightly lower than your elbows and when your fingers are resting on the second row of keys  the back of  your  hands are in line with your forearms.

There are lots of other variations you can make to fine tune your position in terms of screen distance/angle and the use ,or not of wrist/arm supports but if you can get the basics right then you are well on the way to a better position to spend  what is a lot of your time.

Often it helps me to see a photo birds eye view and side view of your work position and I am happy to provide you with a few starters just from these if you e-mail them to me … miles@morningtonosteopathy.com

Even getting all the angles right is only half the story. looking at how we organise our work routine , our downtime and our physical and emotional state whilst at work is often just as important. Sometimes a little bit of ingenuity can be helpful!

Osteopathy has not got all the answers to this but usually a combination of the correct treatment regime and advice is enough to tip the balance towards a more comfortable  and less painful time at work.

Miles James