Tips to Prevent Low Back Pain during Lockdown

During lockdown many of us are busy cleaning our home, lifting heavy stuff while cleaning and standing long hours while cooking. And in this process, we do not realize how much amount of strain we are putting on our back muscles and our spine. Hence, taking care of your back while doing all of these activities inorder to prevent future injuries becomes really important and cannot be ignored because health is what should be prioritized first. So, I would like to mention here some simple ways to protect your back from straining more and to cure mechanical backaches.

While cleaning home or doing household chores, you need to lift things, bend down and many a times have to stand continuously. This might strain your back muscles and the bones of your spine. Suddenly lifting heavy things can cause injuries like slipped disc or prolapsed disc and muscle cramps as well. Inorder to avoid these injuries, it is important to follow some simple ergonomics.

• Lift the weight as close as possible to your body so that the entire body will help to lift it rather than only pressurizing back muscles.
• While lifting something from floor, try to bend your knees rather than bending your back (as shown in the figure). People having knee pain or injury might not be able to do this but a mild squat and bending the back can serve the purpose.

It is completely understandable that while doing work from home and household chores, you do need to stand or sit for a couple of hours. But it is advisable to watch your posture while doing so. Some wrong postures that can cause future back issues are:

• Protruding your shoulders too much.
• Standing with stomach outward for long hours.
• Leaning too much on one side while standing.

Once you get habitual to correct posture, your back pain will eventually reduce and you will feel better. Correct posture also prevents further snack issues.

Doing some simple stretches at home gets you rid of minor back aches and protects your back muscles from straining further. These stretches can be done post a heavy work like lifting, long hours sitting or standing so that they tend to help you relieve the strain on back muscles.

• While doing stretches, make sure your back is properly touched to the surface of bed or mat to maintain spine in neutral position. There should not be too much of arching of your back.
• Use an appropriate and firm support below.
• If you have low flexibility try reaching your own stretch point rather than pushing yourself harder and causing more pain than relief.

Many a times you might as well start feeling back pain while helping your family and getting busy in all the work. But there is a solution for this too. These simple exercises can be done at home at your own pace and you can soon get rid of back pain caused due to strain. These exercises help in strengthening your muscles.

• Cat-Camel Exercise
• Bridging
• Leg Extension lying on your stomach
• Core activation

If posture correction, stretches and exercises are done appropriately, your low back pain can be healed very soon. These are some simple tips which can be followed by any age group people and will definitely help in curing the pain. Also, future back problems are prevented with the help of these. Take care and stay safe everyone!