It might be first relevant to address the question of “does bad posture cause back pain?” By explaining why bad posture is so comfortable. Bad posture is something that builds up over a period of time, it’s a sign of how we’ve been using and abusing our body. Slowly the slouching and slumping in the office chair starts to ingrain a reduced lordosis pattern in the lumbar spine. This reduction in the normal curve of the lower back has the effect of reducing the ability to absorb shock & putting permanent stress through the muscles. At the same time the upper back begins to round leading to increased Kyphosis & the body weight shifting forwards having the effect of increasing mechanical stress. Because this takes place so slowly, the adaption goes generally undetected until it is highlighted in an unexpected side profile photograph.
There are conflicting research papers on back pain being caused by bad posture but one thing is clear. In our experience at The Mayfair Clinic, patients coming to see us with back pain injure and bad posture, the recovery seems to be more of a challenge as we have to contend with more unfavourable factors. An injury, bad habits, bad posture, increased load on an injured tissue, poor muscle balance… and the list goes on.
So, does bad posture cause back pain?
It certainly doesn’t help! But it also has many more consequences that go much further than just back pain! Posture affects the way in which pressure travels through your spine every single day. You’ll start to feel the consequences over time if your posture remains poor. Nowadays, poor posture typically means a “slouching posture” where your head protrudes forwards and your shoulders round. But why does this cause back pain? Imagine holding your bag, 8-10lbs in weight, at arm’s length. Feel how heavy the 8-10lbs become! Well, that’s just like your head as it moves forwards further with bad posture.
Most back pain is compressive, such as “slipped discs” or “disc bulges“. Over a long time, these compressive problems cause “arthritis“, “spondylosis” and other conditions like “spinal stenosis”. Increasing pressure is put on your spine when you have bad posture. It’s no wonder that back pain is made worse, or sometimes caused by bad posture!
How Else Can Bad Posture Affect You?
Aside from back pain, bad posture to the extreme can lead to problems with internal organs, particularly your lungs. When the middle back becomes very rounded and stiff the ability of your ribs to move enough to allow you to fully breathe in becomes impaired.
Bad posture can also lead to neck pain and headaches or migraines. As your head moves forwards it has to pivot to look up. This causes a build up of pressure at the back of your neck just under your skull. This quite often gives tightness and “tension headaches”.
Bad Desk Posture Is Making Your Back Pain Worse!
There is about a 50-70% chance you’re reading this sat down at a desk. If not, on a sofa, it’s the way we spend most of our time today. However, like everything, there is a right and a wrong way. The three red images in the graphic show the normal posture you probably have, but it’s common. Chances are many of your colleagues are suffering from the same poor posture.
It’s important to recognise, that it’s not just desk posture. The office for 6-8 hours a day, the 1-2 hours commuting, an hour or so at the dinner table, and the couple of hours sat down watching the television at the end of the day. Thinking back to what we mentioned in the start or this article, when you consider how long you may be sitting with bad posture, is it a wonder it becomes more of a permanent feature of your posture? One that ultimately will not be good if you are unlucky enough to injure your lower back, or any other part for that matter.
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Back Pain and Your Bad Posture
Standing or sitting, we see an increase of 50% to 100% of the pressure in your Lower back Discs when you are sitting poorly! One study* showed that the muscle tension in the lower back muscles when standing with a “bad posture” increased by over 400%. This was compared with normal upright posture. With your muscles working and producing 400% more tension, is it any wonder you have back ache?
You have probably first noticed the back pain as “muscle pain”, this reaction can often be to bad posture. Given the study mentioned above, it’s very likely that keeping this elevated muscle tension will become a problem further down the line.
The Overlooked Part Of Posture And Back Pain
Your Head! Earlier we mentioned that your head is effectively an 8-10lb ball at the top of your spine. This ball is also, for many people, not in the right place. Forwards translation of your head is something that is probably present right now as you are reading this. We saw the effect poor posture had on muscle tension in the lower back earlier (an increase of 400%). Your head position generally leads your posture. So if the head is over the shoulders, it becomes quite difficult to have bad posture. By correcting this part of your posture you can improve your overall muscle tension. You will reduce you lumbar disc pressure, and keep back pain at bay!
Are You Suffering Repeated Back Pain Episodes?
We now have a better idea of the effects of bad posture on back pain, it makes it worse! But bad posture can also, given our experience, affect the recovery of the unfortunate back injury.
Bad Posture & Back Injury
Although most of the back pain patients we see, struggle to pinpoint an initial event that kicked off their back pain, being able to do so can help with treatment a lot! When It comes to recovery, posture plays a big part. Short term posture for most back injuries is very poor and normally involved bending forwards a bit. But one of the reasons people don’t recover as well as they should is because their posture doesn’t return to normal fast enough. This means they will still be putting too much pressure through the damaged lower back structures, such as the discs or ligaments. These injured tissues want to recover but bad posture means they can’t get a break!
For Example, If you had accidentally “slipped a disc”. There will be damage to the tissue which needs time to heal. If your posture remains poor, and you are putting say, 50%-100% more pressure on that injured disc, is it really going to be able to heal well? Unlikely.
It’s like having a cut on your skin, but each time you form a scab you pick it off. We’ve all had this experience in our younger years, and it always leads to a scab (scar tissue forming). It’s visible that this scar tissue is not as healthy as the normal skin. The same happens inside your body. So avoiding bad posture should be top on your priority if you injure your back!
So What Can You Do To Make Sure Bad Posture Is Not Giving You Back Pain?
Shift Your Focus
When it comes to posture and back pain, focusing too closely on the back itself will not help improve your posture. Instead of focussing higher up on the middle back and neck will work much more effectively. This holds true for about 90% of cases. Poor posture as you probably know by now is a full spinal issue that regularly contributes to low back pain if not causes it. Here are some of our top tips for you to work on to help improve your posture.
Chest Stretching Exercises
One of our favourite ways to help posture when people have a rounded middle back is a chest stretch. Doing this undoes all of the damage that modern day life causes. Simply lying on your back in a crucifix position and holding will in most cases be enough to feel the stretch through your chest and shoulders. You can also bend your elbows to 90 degrees and let your forearms roll backwards to touch the floor. Check out the video on this page to show you, and talk you through this really easy chest stretch that’s great for your posture. (Click Here To Skip Ahead To The Video)
Another chest stretching approach is to swim on your back doing “double arm backstroke”. This technique is a dynamic way of opening out your chest, whilst your spine is held in a nice neutral position by the water.
Stand Up Straight!
It sounds simple but the very first thing you can do is to open your chest out, pull your shoulders back and look straight ahead. This posture is often miss-interpreted as an arrogant posture, research has shown that the effects of such a posture go far beyond helping reducing back pain. This sort of positive posture has been shown to affect even your mood and hormone levels in a positive way.
Practically, test yourself by standing with your heels, bum and then middle back and head touching the wall. If any part of this is difficult, it will usually be the head that doesn’t naturally or easily rest on the wall. Bear this in mind and take steps to strengthen your back muscles and work on standing straighter. You can do this by being more conscious of your posture, and by working out in the gym or at home.
Avoid Forward Bending & Stretch
We’ve mentioned earlier that poor posture is essentially forward bending becoming part of your posture. You’ll often see people bending their neck forwards to try to stretch their shoulder muscles. You might even be guilty of this yourself! This doesn’t help posture, it only stretches muscles that are already overstretched and tired. Avoiding these stretches will be really important if you want to succeed in improving your posture and reducing your back pain.
Stretch The Muscles On The Front Of Your Neck
Chances are that if you’ve got poor posture your head is protruding forward, even though you might not like to admit it. Stretching these muscles out is very simple.
Start facing straight forward with “good posture”
Rotate your head 45 degrees to the right.
Tilt your head to the right side so your ear moves towards the back of your shoulder
Hold until the stretch on the front-left side of your neck and jaw eases.
Repeat for the other side.
Note: do this stretch very slowly and carefully. If you feel any dizziness stop immediately.
Still concerned about your back pain or bad posture?
If you’re not quite sure about how to fix your bad posture on your own, or you’re suffering from persistent back pain then get in touch by completing the form below and we’ll be sure to get back to you to help in any way we can. For more of our latest articles, visit our articles page by clicking the link here. You can also work on your back pain and posture from home by joining our Back In Shape Membership Site Below.
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