This might be new for you, so here are 7 reasons to visit London Osteopathic Care.
1. The office chair
As if working for 8 hours a day isn’t enough, office chairs remain one of the main causes of back pain in the UK. Being glued to your chair all day puts 40% more pressure on your spine than standing, and maintaining a healthy posture in your chair is highly unlikely while your mind is focused on deadlines.
While you are confined to a chair your back muscles weaken from not being used. Your joints become inactive while losing lubrication, and your muscles age faster.
2. Everyday commute
If you are required to be behind a steering wheel for your whole day, your chest muscles are likely to tighten, causing your shoulders to round. This negatively affects your posture, making you look heavier and can easily cause back & neck problems.
Back and neck pain caused by commuting commonly occurs in delivery drivers, business men going from meeting to meeting, and even mothers who juggle work, shopping, and picking up the kids.
3. Headaches, neck, and back pain
The busyness of London can become too much too handle for most of us, thus another common culprit of chronic headaches, neck and back pain is stress. When life becomes too overwhelming we all experience distress.
Distress is caused by the activation of your sympathetic nervous system. This is what we commonly understand as the ‘fight – or – flight’ system. Your heart rate increases, your blood pressure rises, and your hormonal system releases adrenaline and cortisol.
These in turn cause muscles in various parts of your body to tense up, with the result being chronic headaches, as well as severe neck and back pain.
4. Smart phones
The urge to continuously remain connected takes its toll on all our body’s eventually. We know very well what being glued in a chair does to our spine, neck, and back muscles.
Constantly being in the head-down position produced by phones, iPads and laptops cause tension in the neck which can extend down the spine to your lower back.
What’s even worse is that your body will eventually adopt a ‘hunched position’.
5. Pregnancy
It is estimated that a baby is born every 40 seconds in Britain. Although the specific amount born in London isn’t available, lower back pain is a prevalent condition among majority of pregnant women.
The most likely causes of severe back pain in pregnant women are weight gain, posture changes, hormonal changes, and muscle separation.
Furthermore, recovering from child birth is often an added stress when having to attend to a new-born.
6. Lifting objects
Without understanding the proper technique, individuals frequently lifting heavy objects, lifting objects while twisting, or suddenly moving while lifting, are at risk of serious lower back pain.
The two common types of lower back strain that occur, are muscle strain and lumbar sprain.
Muscle strain happens when the muscle is over-stretched or torn, otherwise known as a ‘pulled muscle’. A lumbar sprain happens when ligaments are stretched too far or torn.
7. Unhealthy lifestyle
People who are required to sit still most of their day and do little to no physical exercise can be said to live a ‘sedentary lifestyle’, which is very unhealthy.
Lack of exercise, static postural positions and smoking form the basis of an unhealthy lifestyle.
Extra weight around the mid-section pulls the pelvis forward and creates lower back pain in overweight individuals. Smoking restricts blood vessels of the lower back.
Unhealthy or sedentary people lack the nourishment necessary for healthy spinal discs, soft tissues, and ligaments
Everyday Londoner’s have busy schedules and often fail to identify the causes of the back pain mentioned above. Visiting an osteopath can help you identify the causes, and treat the symptoms associated with neck and back pain. An osteopath will also work with you towards a healthier physical well-being. Treatment of the above physical ailments either fall under structural, cranial, or classical osteopathy. The practitioners at London Osteopathic Care use all three osteopathic techniques.
If you would like more information, visit the London Osteopathic Care website, or make an appointment today.