4 Steps to Reducing Back Pain

#2 - Incorporate safe body mechanics into activities.
Use good body mechanics during daily tasks at home and work. What does that mean? Good body mechanics means keeping your spine in a balanced safe position while you move. By remembering a few simple ideas, you can help to avoid back injury and pain. First, you should use your leg and arm muscles when bending and lifting -- not your back muscles. Secondly, keep your spine/back straight when bending and lifting. And last but not least, make sure to bend at your hips and knees, not at your waist.

An example of correctly bending at the hips and knees.

#3 - Exercise on a regular basis.
Regular maintenance of things we own helps to keep them working efficiently, safely and with less effort. The same is true of the spine.

•Exercising on a regular basis helps to maintain spine health on a long-term basis.
•Regular exercise helps to increase endurance and reduces fatigue.

But don't I get enough exercise at work?
Some people think their jobs provide enough exercise - particularly jobs that are physical and may include manual labor. Unfortunately this is not true. People need daily exercise to condition and strengthen their muscles to perform job tasks efficiently and safely.

Exercise can be fun! There are many different types of exercise. One way to ensure success when choosing to begin an exercise program is to choose some type of exercise that fits into your lifestyle. If exercise is convenient and accessible you will be more likely to continue exercising on a long term basis. For example, deciding to swim daily or perform water aerobics without easy access to a pool year round would make consistency difficult and success even less likely.

A common exercise that many people begin successfully with is walking. Walking is generally easy to fit into a daily schedule, can be done year round, and only requires a good pair of walking shoes. For more information on walking, hydration, and what type of shoes to wear visit http://walking.about.com/.

Remember, what ever type of exercise you choose, always start out small (10 minutes versus 35 minutes) and increase gradually. This will also help to ensure your success at getting started and sticking with an exercise program. Add one or two stretching exercises, like a calf stretch, to your routine for additional benefit.

An example of a calf stretch.

#4 - Fuel your body with proper nutrition.
Eating a healthy diet provides the fuel your body needs to produce energy. And energy is required to perform work, meaning the tasks we do throughout the day, including work tasks and exercise. Proper nutrition also helps to maintain your ideal body weight. Weight management is a good way to control stress on the joints in your body including the spine.

Not sure where to begin to learn about proper nutrition and setting up a healthy diet for you and your lifestyle? Then check out Introduction to Nutrition and Steps to a Healthier You: Inside the Food Pyramid. By incorporating these tips into your daily life, you can promote a healthy situation for your spine over the years.