Why do I have back pain? Being a chiropractor in San Diego, I hear this question all the time. Back pain and neck pain are the two most common complaints that my patients have. The fact that my practice is in San Diego probably decreases the frequency of these complaints. People in San Diego tend to be more active than those who live in other parts of the country which actually lowers the incidence of low back and neck pain.
Over fifteen years ago when I first started practicing chiropractic care in San Diego, most of my low back pain patients and neck pain patients for that matter were not related to office work. Most of the cases that I had when I first started practicing were do to injuries like car accidents and falls or heavy work.
In the mid to late nineteen nineties, I started to see a trend in injury mechanisms among my patients. They were starting to attribute their pain to long hours of sitting at the computer.
Sitting all day at the computer not only causes back pain but it also causes neck pain, headaches, carpal tunnel syndrome and various arm problems.
Lower back pain is primarily due to poor sitting posture. When we are standing up with good posture, our lower backs have a sweeping forward bowing curve that resembles a stretched out letter "c". This shape distributes our bodies weight evenly throughout the spine. When we sit, this curve reverses, greatly increasing the stress on the joints and discs in the spine.
With time, postural stress causes irritation and inflammation resulting in pain and muscle spasms.
Once the low back has reached a point of pain and spasms, chiropractic care is necessary to relieve the pain, improve the biomechanics of the spine and relax the muscles.
In addition to chiropractic care for back pain, the patient must seek out an ergonomic chair and have it adjusted properly for their body. In many cases, I suggest a complete workstation analysis to help prevent future problems related to postural stress.
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