Right posture helps spine

Hyderabad: The right posture while sitting, standing and also walking is important for maintaining spine health, say doctors ahead of World Spine Day, which will be observed on October 16.

One in every three women and one in every five men suffer from back pain, ranking it as the highest in terms of disability and sixth in terms of overall disease burden. The three major problems faced in the spine are related to muscles, discs and bones.

Dr Praveen Mereddy, orthopaedic surgeon at Care Hospital, said, “The problems in the back begin at the disc level where the fluid begins to dry and the bone flattens. This is because of excessive stress to the spinal chord.

This stress is caused due to improper postures and wrong body positions over a prolonged period of time. Worse off are bike and pillion riders who drive for long hours without any comfortable place to rest their back.

This, along with poor road conditions, aggravates the stress on the back leading to lower back pains.” Those who sit for long hours at work are also prone to back problems. One needs to walk around every hour and relax the back and neck muscles so that they are active.

Dr Sanjay Tapadi, senior orthopaedic surgeon at Mediciti Hospital, said, “The major problem is that a lot of people carry weights on one side without understanding that weight must be divided.

Heavy weights must always be divided between both sides so that the spine is able to balance the weight. These simple rules help. We see a lot of cases of mechanical failure of the spine where these mistakes have led to  the wear and tear of the discs.”

Apart from ageing and degenerative problems, doctors say that people have a habit of bending forward which is very bad for the spine. Dr Tapadi said, “This forward stretch is very painful and also causes further wear and tear of the spine muscles.”