Bad lifting and reaching is one of the most common ways patients hurt themselves. We all know you should bend at the knees to lift heavy objects off the floor. The small things like twisting in your chair and reaching for your lap top, shoes or kids toys for example are the things that tend to cause back injuries.
The 10 times rule is: Any object your are picking up is 10 times heavy with your arms extended. Example, when you are holding your child that is 20 pounds against your chest you have an additional 20 pounds of pressure on your spine. If you were to hold your child straight out at arms length (ala Michael Jackson over a high balcony-not recommended!) you would have 200 pounds of pressure on your back (20×10=200 for those bad math people out there).
When picking up any object use short alligator arms, don’t reach and twist. It is the worst thing for your back. If you do hurt yourself give me a call.
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