Tips for Preventing Pain

Office-Ergo.com offers a great checklist of symptoms and issues along with ways to alleviate them without costing you a penny. For those Quasimodo shoulders, the site suggests lowering the work surface or keyboard, lowering chair armrests, raising your chair (as long as you can still put your feet flat on the floor in the new position), or habit and tension training.

Excessive mousing can be mitigated, it suggests, by greater work variety (okay I didn't say all suggestions were applicable!), an aggressive break schedule (right …), alternating the mousing hand, using alternative pointing devices (a trackball, for example), using an arm support such as a small table, moving the mouse closer to your body (perhaps with an extended keyboard tray), or learning the keystroke substitutes for menu items.

On the same site, you can find a page listing fourteen points to consider about lower back pain. (The page is at http://office-ergo.com/12things.htm - guess someone had a couple last minute thoughts). The list includes tips such as a "supported slouch" is actually better for your back than is sitting up straight the way Mom told you to.

Actually, Mom's admonition to stop fidgeting and sit still wasn't ergonomically sound either. Experts don't recommend sitting in one position for a long time. In fact, getting up and stretching frequently should definitely be on your to-do list.

The Encyclopedia of Business on Answers.com has a nice article on the basics of setting up your workspace and working healthy, from the position of the monitor to the need for a good stretch. The work is based on a paper from the government's occupational and health safety folks. It recommends, for example, positioning the keyboard so your forearms and wrists are aligned when you're typing, and to use a keyboard that you're comfortable with.

Regardless of the approach you take, though, remember: Pain means you're hurting yourself! If modification of your work habits and environment don't do the trick, don't try to be macho and avoid seeing a doctor until the agony is too much to bear. You're risking the quality of the rest of your life, and possibly your livelihood.

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