Driving And Back Pain - Is Your Car Seat Causing Lower Back Pain?
A lot of us perceive lower back pain whilst driving. A number of researches have investigated the relationship between driving and Back Pain, which uncovered uncovered some curious results. One looking is a comparison of drivers in the Usa and in Sweden found that 50% of population questioned in both countries reported low back pain.
Driving And Back Pain - Is Your Car Seat Causing Lower Back Pain?
Driving And Back Pain - Is Your Car Seat Causing Lower Back Pain?
Driving And Back Pain - Is Your Car Seat Causing Lower Back Pain?
Driving And Back Pain - Is Your Car Seat Causing Lower Back Pain?
So what is the relationship of driving and back pain?
So far study has found three factors for low back pain whilst driving. The first one is the vibration from the machine (something that you can not change), the sitting position is the second factor and the third one is the length of time that we drive.
Scientists at laboratories have researched the effects of vibration of our body whilst driving. The Lumbar Spine(lower back) naturally resonates at a frequency of 4-5 Hertz and from study they found that this natural frequency can be distorted. This distortion can result into higher spinal loadings (compression) in the lower back, therefore causing an increased opening of low back pain. As mentioned before you can not change the vibration of the engine, but what you can do to sacrifice the effects of this on your lower back is to drive shorter periods at a time.
It is a lot easier to get comfortable in your seat when the car is stationary, a bit like sitting in a general chair. But once you start driving the body will be branch to various soldiery like accelerations and decelerations, lateral Movements from side to side and whole body vibrations.When we sit on a chair our feet, when on the floor, are used to keep and stabilise the lower body. Whilst driving our abdominal muscles can not furnish sufficient stability to our upper body and arms when turning the wheel. This will result in a principal growth of torsional stresses in the lower back, which in return will significantly growth the risk of low back pain.
To start with we should address one more prominent issue first - we all are guilty when it comes to adjusting our car seats correctly! In 2004 one of the largest car guarnatee clubs (I won't mention a name, after all you may think I am paid to write about this), released the findings of a study into how we sit in our car. (about 2.000 population were complicated in this).
The study resulted in the following -
The headrest was found to be in an incorrect angle when driving of 61% of population complicated in the study. This will growth the opening of ruptures of the spinal ligaments or worse when complicated in an accident.
50% showed a slouched or hunched position over the steering wheel.
About a third of the drivers had back pain whilst driving.
25% tilted their heads or shifted in their seats each time they had to look into the 'rear view mirror'.
Wearing unsuitable footwear or clothing happened to 34% of the drivers.
Please find below a list of 10 ways that can help to enhance your seating position, make your driving perceive more comfortable.
The Seat
Make sure that your bottom sits all the way in the back of the seat - where the base and the back of the seat meet. This will help to make you sit more upright and verbalize the natural curvature of the spine, minimizing the stress on the spinal ligaments. If your seat has a lumbar roll built in have this all the way out - most cars with lumbar keep that i tried do not allow sufficient keep fom this lumbar roll, therefore it would be best to have it all the way out.
The Base length and Height of the Seat
The base of the seat should never touch the back of your knees and the front of the base should be sLightly higher then the back, helping to furnish more keep and allowing you press the pedals without changing your spinal posture.
The Backrest
First relax back into your seat, place the seat at about a 10-15 degrees incline from the vertical position. If this feels unnatural to you then it probably means that the backrest is not upright sufficient for you. This can result into neck strain and / or coccyx (sitting bone) pain. Move the backrest more upright or if that doesn't help you can place a small towel (folded in three) against the midspine, between the shoulder blades.
The Headrest
Have you ever noticed when Watching an American movie that the headrests are often missing from the seats - it makes me crinch each time i see this (ooch). So much for giving a good example to our children. The position of your headrest will not only help to minimise the injuries of an urgency but also to help to allow a great posture. The bony bit at the back of your head (known as the 'inion') is a good guiding point, the headrest should be level with this. There should be about 2.3 cm's (1 inch for the non -metrics) between the back of your head and the headrest, when you are in the sitting position as described earlier. This to dispell shock as much as possible. This allows for the ligaments and the muscles of your neck to control the posture of your head great and giving great keep in case of an accident.
Seat - Pedal distance
Make sure you have the length between seat and the pedals so that when operating the pedals this does not cause you to over strech your legs or twist your body in any way. Thus your legs should not be level when pushing the throttle or clutch all the way down. Obviously your knees should not be bend to the point you cannot verily Move from one pedal to another. It is normally advised to have your knees bend about 45 degrees.
The Arm position
Your arms should be as relaxed as possible, elbows bend colse to 20-30 degrees. If your steering wheel is adjustable have it in the mid to lower position (make sure the wheel does not partially obstruct the instrument panel), this will help to sacrifice the stress on your shoulders. Your hands should be positioned at '10 past10' and not as is recommend left hand at 9 o'clock and right hand at 3 o'clock.
The Armrests
If your seat has armrests then it is advised to use these. As a guidance you should position the armrests so that they gently keep the elbows, any more will cause the shoulders to rise and growth the change of straining your neck.
The Mirrors
These should only be adjusted once you have positioned your seat as described above. If not sure then please revisit the facts again how to adjust your seat. The mirrors should be adjusted to allow you to freely look into them without the need of having to move your head much. You either have adjusted the mirrors incorrectly or you are to close to the steering wheel.
Adjusting Seat at intervals
This sound great in principles but for most of us this may be akward whilst driving. For those who have electric seats it is easier (although it all the time advicable to stop first), just reach for the buttons to adjust the seat without the need to take our attentiveness of the road. It is said that you should be doing this every 30 mins. To sacrifice the incidents of back pain. This allows to change the pressure that is located on the spine is various regularly. Once arrived at your destination it would be good to strech! (don't worry if it looks funny, soon everyone in the carpark will join in - you can be proud having started a new 'healthy' trend)
Have breaks
We all have seen the 'take a break' sign along the roads, helping you to avoid falling asleep behind the wheel. Taking a break helps your back as well, so when you need to take a rest you can have a strech at the same time to help your back. An hour maximum is the current thinking, although these tips should be taken as a general rule. This is a good time to adjust your seating position!
Driving And Back Pain - Is Your Car Seat Causing Lower Back Pain?
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