Ergonomic working environment is important to your health

Dear OCAIRers:
Recently I have learned some new knowledge through my personal experience and would like very much to share with you. This is very important to our health as a professional worker at computer.

The knowledge is ergonomic working environment. In recent 3 month, I first found pain started from my back shoulder blade, My doctor and an orthopedic doctor found nothing wrong with my backbone by X-rays. They treated me as muscle/joint stress with strong pain killer and anti-inflammatory medicine and numbness of the right arm and hand. I knew it was not the muscle problem anymore. Someone suggested me to see our director of environment and health. She came in to give me a good evaluation of my work environment and find out my sitting position problems.

My pain problems probably caused by working at the computer. She sent me to a work-related disease doctor through work comp. The doctor found I have ”Degeneration of Cervical Intervertebral Disc”, (search this online you will learn more about this) which means the soft disk between net bones slid to one side and pinch some nerves to cause pain and numbness. Also because its displacement, it is easy to grow bony spurs to cause more pain. Dr. says this is very common for people who work at computers at the wrong sitting position or through car accident, especially when they get old. The degeneration of cervical disc happens after age of 30 for most people. Once the cervical disc moves or shrinks it will pinch some nerve and grow bony spur to cause, pain or numbness of legs, arms, shoulders, mouth and headache. A lot of people got headache without knowing the reason. This is probably one of the major reasons to cause unknown headache. The earlier it is diagnosed, the easier it can be corrected by physical therapy.

Now I am going through physical therapy 3 days a week to correct the position of my cervical discs. I do neck tractions 2 times a day with a special device at home. This is really helpful to release pain. The function is that you stretch your neck bones and spine to give more room for discs to move back the right position. I also feel I am taller than before J. So surgery is only the last straw and never a good choice for such kind of problem.

So I learned something about ergonomic environment. I think everyone should pay a bit attention to this. The director and doctor’s suggestions are:

1. I need to change an adjustable chair to support my back bone, never use chair arms in typing. (An ergonomic chair must be evaluated by specialist not any kind in the market). When you sit far back on your chair, you legs should have two fingers’ space. Always sit in the straight up position. (Please remember it is required by CA law that the employer should supply the right equipment for work, so check your HR offices).
2. Raise you LCD screen to your eye level with an adjustable monitor riser ($20), When you close and open your eyes, you should see straight the top blue bar of your window screen. If you use a laptop for a long time (that is my problem), raise your laptop screen with a monitor stand to the eye level with an extra keyboard. Never bend you head and shoulder with your laptop for a long time.
3. Never use a wrist rest for keyboard and mouse, because they actually block your blood circulation and nerve pulses, if you type for a longer time or repeatedly use the position for your work. Typing is like playing a piano with your arms in the air. When you use mouse, use the whole arm and hand to move the mouse not only the hand.
4. Keep the keyboard at the position lower than or the same level of elbows to keep blood circulating to figures. So you may need to buy an adjustable keyboard tray.
5. A foot rest may be needed for short ladies. Facing and seeing your office door to keep energy in and never use your back to face the door (FengShui is used here by my Director).
6. Always stretch out after 20-30 minutes computer work.

The Doctor gave me some instructions for computer stretches. They work very well for me. So I attach here for you to try, So take care of yourself from a young age.