Summer's Most Avoidable Hazard

Fashion for cents but no foot sense

Flip-Flops. Klip-klappere. Chancletas. In every language, there seems to be a whimsical name for a flat backless sandal.

You see flip-flops on designers' runways. At the beach. In high school classrooms. On sidewalks in big cities.

They're inexpensive. Lightweight. Cool. Available in an endless selection of colors. Decorated with sequins or the logo of your favorite sports team.

What's not to like?

Between now and October, I'll see a staggering number of foot problems--and flip-flops will be to blame for most of them.

Here's why:

• Trips and falls. Because the flip-flop's anchor is between your great toe and your second toe--not in the middle of your foot--you can lose your balance and slide off.
• Breaks and bruises. Drop something on your foot, stub your toe. Ouch.
• Aches and pains. Flip-flops provide no support for your foot, your legs, your hips, your spine.
• Viruses and infections. Plantar warts, athlete's foot, blisters, cracked heels.
• Stress on growing bones. It takes up to 18 years for the foot to fully develop. Flip-flops force growing feet into stressful positions.

Every time your foot hits the ground, it creates an impact up to your ankle, knee, hip, and spine. Take good care of your feet and your feet will take care of you:

• Do wear flip-flops around the pool or in the yard.
• Do vary the shoes that you wear.
• Do buy new flip-flops frequently. When they are wearing unevenly or look out of shape, it's time for a new color.
• Don't wear flip-flops on city streets or in airports.
• Don't wear flip-flops 24/7.
• Don't wear flip-flops when you are carrying heavy objects-like backpacks or groceries.

 

 

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The Secret to Improving Your Golf Game

What the pros might not tell you

A lot of people are afraid to play golf. They think it's bad for their backs.

But you can play golf safely and without pain if you pay attention to your posture.

This is the secret of today's title: If your posture is good, you'll play better. Good posture improves your swing.

Good posture in golf requires that you keep your spine straight . Don't curve your body into a C-shape with your head hanging down.

Stretch for a Smooth, Strong Swing

Golf, like every athletic activity, requires flexibility, strength, endurance, and the ability to relax. Stretching helps you keep your posture correct and your swing strong. Stretch before you play and between holes.

• You need flexible strong hip muscles to turn your hips. Stretch your hip flexors by slowing raising your foot toward your buttocks. Hold your toes and feel the stretch in the front of your thigh.
• You need strong trunk muscles to hold your spine stable. Pull in your abdominal muscles as you walk the course.
• You need flexible and strong shoulder muscles to swing your upper arms. Reach your hands around your shoulders and give yourself a hug. For more stretches, see my video.

What Causes Golf Injuries?

For one thing, clubs. To avoid injury, treat your clubs like any heavy item: your printer, a big bag of garden mulch. Remember:

• Keep heavy items close to your body.
• Don't lift and twist at the same time. Looking straight ahead, first lift your clubs. Then turn.
• Bend your knees to lift.

Golf Mania

Golf is good for you because it involves varied motions and walking. But sometimes, enthusiasm for the sport leads to injuries:

• Play golf only when the temperature is above 50 degrees. In cold weather, your muscles don't warm up and you're more prone to injury.
• At the practice range, vary your shots. To avoid repetitive motion injuries, don't practice the same swing 100 times.
• No matter how eager you are to play, stretch first. Don't jump out of your car, sprint to the first tee, and swing. (Don't "grip" the club and "rip" your muscle.)

Best foot forward: Golf shoes wear out rapidly. If you play once a week, buy new shoes every season.

April 23: Administrative Professionals Day

Thinking chocolates and lunch? Think again.

Administrative professionals day--which began as "Secretary's Day" in 1952--is perhaps the most observed workplace holiday. But it's not only about flowers, gift baskets, candy, and lunch.

For the April 23 observance, supervisors who want to recognize their support staff should think about ways to promote learning and professional development. By investing in training or workplace enhancements, bosses show that they value the contributions of administrative professionals.

From factories to schools to professional services firms to the White House, administrative professionals contribute at many levels and in many ways. They keyboard. They talk on the phone. They change the toner. They negotiate. They organize. They manage.

Frequently, these roles involve long hours in fixed positions, lifting heavy items, and working in cramped spaces. One way to show you really care about a coworker is to simply ask, "Are you comfortable?" This can be the start of a conversation about good ergonomic habits, which prevent workplace injuries.

Let's look at two workplace accessories that can create discomfort for people in administrative roles: the telephone and the printer.

• Telephone. When you or your assistant talk on the phone, sit back in your chair as though keying. Make sure your shoulder blades touch the back of the chair. You should be able to reach 90 percent of everything you need without straining. Ideally, wear a cordless headset so you can move around.
• Printer. Make sure you or your assistant is not sitting near a high-volume printer. Printers can be extremely unhealthy, and they are noisy and smelly. Printers should be located so you and your colleagues have to stand up to get to them. Walking to the printer is a good break from sitting in one position for a long time.

Remember, when you recognize your coworkers on April 23:

• Flowers are nice. So is an ergonomic foot rest or a telephone headset.
• Lunch is always welcome. So is an ergonomic assessment of your colleague's workspace.
• Candy is delightful. So is a coworker who takes time to make sure that everyone in the office can work comfortably and feel valued.

To help them learn more about working safely, forward this newsletter to your coworkers. And take some time during Administrative Professionals Week, April 21 to 25, to help your colleagues adjust their work sites for comfort and productivity.

For Accountants, One-Minute Solutions

No time? You still can prevent computer overuse injuries

Accountants have no time. With corporate tax returns due March 15 and individual returns due April 15, every minute counts.

Today's newsletter is super short to show that, whatever your time limitations, it's still possible to take good care of yourself.

Over the next six weeks, here are some quick things accountants can do to prevent injury:

• Adjust your chair. Before you start to work in a new space, make sure your arms are parallel to the floor.
• Sit back in your chair. Make sure your shoulder blades touch the back of your chair.
• Use a book or a box for a footstool. When you sit, your knees should be higher than your hips.
• Use a separate keyboard and mouse. Attach an outboard keyboard and mouse to you laptop.
• Drink water. When your muscles are hydrated they are less prone to injury.
• Get enough light. In hotel rooms, take time to adjust the lighting.
• Take a break. Every hour, look up from your computer for 3 minutes. Stretch your arms. Relax your neck. Close your eyes.

Remember, two minutes of stretching is better than no stretching. A glance out the window to rest your eyes and refresh your spirit takes only 5 seconds. A quick stretch gives you stamina and prevents injury.

When you're working intensely, you can still take a moment for yourself. Because, as an accountant will tell you, every little bit adds up.

Working at Home: Shed Some Light on the Subject

How to light your home office

Despite the long-ago invention of the electric light bulb, many of us work in the dark. Do your eyes feel dry? Do they ache? Do you constantly need to change the prescription of your eyeglasses?

If so, look carefully at the lighting in your home office or workplace. You can control three factors:

• Is the room bright enough? Does the environment make you feel cheerful and invigorated?
• Can you see to complete your task? Is it easy to read a book, find function keys on your keyboard, see a handwritten column of figures?
• Is there glare coming off your screen? Do reflections make it hard to see the screen?

Room lighting

However much light you have in your home office, bring in another lamp. The home office is a stepchild, collecting cast-offs from around the house. Lighting is expensive, and frequently there isn't enough.

In my office, there are a task lamp, two standing lamps that provide ambient lighting, and two windows.

Ambient light should cast a sufficient glow. Library lights that illuminate a tiny circle on a desk or table do not provide ambient lighting.

Task lighting

To read fine print or see your keyboard, you need flexible task lighting. Depending on what you're doing, you should be able to adjust the light so it shines where you need it most. The best task lights:

• Have an arm with an elbow.
• Are sturdy enough to stay put when you position them.
• Have a shade that cuts down on glare.
• Don't get hot.

Glare

As you look at your monitor, do you see the reflection of a ceiling light or the outdoors behind you? Do you sometimes feel as if you're looking into a mirror? Here are some ways to cut down on glare:

• Move your monitor so it is perpendicular to the window or light.
• Turn off your overhead light and bring in a floor lamp.
• Use a dimmer on your overhead light.

Quick Fix: If the lamp at your desk isn't providing enough light, put a book or two under it. When you raise the lamp, light disperses over a larger area.

Temporary Office? Avoid Long-Lasting Pain

How to make casual workspaces fit

Are you spending less time at your desk these days?

If so, you're not alone.

Today's office workers are more mobile--even when they don't leave town. They work casually in a team meeting room. They share a desk with colleagues who work different hours. They use borrowed space at a client's facility.

This mobility adds up to better work/life balance, improved communication and teamwork, increased productivity.

But sometimes mobility can be a pain in the neck--literally.

If you've gone to the trouble to set up your workspace so that it fits your body type and work habits, it's no good if you never sit there.

Personalize Your Temporary Space

When you use different work spaces, you may carry a family photo with you. Similarly, you need to personalize every space by adjusting the height of your keyboard, the tilt of your monitor, the angle of your chair.

Pack a few items in addition to your laptop and cell phone:

• Mouse. If you can only pack one item, bring a mouse. Using the built-in touchpad or trackball increases your risk of carpal tunnel syndrome.
• Keyboard. Lightweight keyboards roll up for easy packing. Your hands will be more relaxed when they are not cramped.
• Footstool. A collapsible footstool weighs 12 ounces and takes pressure off your thighs. No room in your bag? Borrow a fat book.

Before you start to work, adjust the chair. Most office chairs are adjustable, so this is the easiest and most important step. You should be able to keyboard comfortably with your forearms parallel to the floor.

When the chair is not adjustable, try arranging the furniture in a new way. In a conference room with a high table and soft, low chairs, you can sit on a fat book. In a hotel room, you might sit on an ottoman and put your keyboard on an end table.

Remember, you can bring these principles to your home office.

Law, the Painful Profession

How can attorneys and paralegals counteract the effects of long hours and temporary work spaces?

Of all the professions, computer-related injuries seem most common among attorneys and paralegals. As I visit law firms to assist with office layout and equipment choices, I see a high proportion of attorneys in pain. Even third-year law students seem exceptionally prone to injury.

Put Perry Mason, Atticus Finch, and Ally McBeal in a courtroom together, and Attorney Mason would be nursing sore wrists, Attorney Finch would be complaining of neck pain, and Attorney Beal would be in denial: "That isn't going to happen to me."

What makes the law such a hazardous profession?

1. Lawyers are driven by billable hours, and they sit for long periods of time.
2. Lawyers work with lots of paper and thick documents.
3. Lawyers frequently work on laptops away from their primary work area.

Here's how attorneys and paralegals can mitigate each of these factors:

Too much time in the chair. Attorneys experience back and neck pain because they spend so much time sitting. The compression force on the lower back is 100 pounds greater when sitting than when standing.

What to do: Take time to adjust your workspace, including your chair. Sit back in your chair; don't hunch. Move around at least once every 35 minutes. Stand up to answer the telephone. Instead of sending an email, walk to a coworker's desk and chat. Try using a stand-up desk.

Paper everywhere. When I consult with lawyers, they are surrounded with paper. We may live in modern times but papers are on the desk and on the floor. Some attorneys are reaching from their keyboards down to the floor to look at documents that may be many hundreds of pages.

What to do: Get an inline document holder and use it. When your monitor, documents, and keyboard all are centered around the same midline, you reduce strain on your neck. To review documents, sit at a desk, not your computer station. Use a reading slant to put your papers at an angle.

Ad hoc work spaces. Especially while traveling, attorneys keyboard in places not meant for computer use: The hotel cocktail table puts a strain on their wrists. The too-soft, too-low conference room chair puts pressure on their backs. The constant use of PDAs for hundreds of emails makes their hands hurt.

What to do: Even if you expect to borrow a desk just to answer a few emails, take a moment to adjust the borrowed chair so you have correct posture. Put your laptop on a surface at the right height for keyboarding, and raise the back about an inch and a half with a book. With the intensity of legal work, a few emails can turn into hours crouched in an uncomfortable position.

To learn more about lawyers and repetitive motion injuries, visit my website.

Try Keyboards Before You Buy

Keying for eight hours is like walking 10 miles

People frequently ask me what keyboard is "best." Sometimes a paralegal with wrist pain hopes a new keyboard will make the pain go away. Or a computer programmer wants to know the benefits of a colleague's spiffy-looking keyboard. Or an accountant is finding an aging keyboard harder to use.

For all these individuals, the most important message is: no one size fits all. The best keyboard for you probably won't work for your neighbor in the next cube.

You can find all shapes and sizes of keyboards. Each person needs to find a keyboard that lets him or her work without putting stress on shoulders, elbows, wrists, fingers, and thumbs.

So you need to test drive keyboards. You can't buy a keyboard by looking at a photo in a catalog or on a website.

Here are some ways to evaluate a keyboard:

• Sit back in your chair. Are you able to reach the keyboard with your back against the chair and your arms at your side? Some keyboards have rigid wrist rests that force you to reach forward. That's a posture to avoid.
• Keep your shoulders broad. If you're hunching forward to key, pull the keyboard closer to your body.
• Center your body on the GBH keys. If you're not comfortable, try angling the keyboard toward one side or the other.
• Pull your elbows in. If your elbows are sticking out, try another keyboard.
• Make sure your hands feel comfortable. Some split keyboards have a very large space in the middle. If you're a small person, this can be tiring.
• Look for flexibility. Any position, no matter how comfortable, can become a strain after a full morning's work. Look for a keyboard that you can adjust over the course of the day.
• Keep your mouse close. Keyboards with separate number keypads force you to reach farther for the mouse. Most people don't use the number pad enough to justify that constant reaching.
• Customize the fit. Does your keyboard have feet? Raise and lower them to try different positions.
• Wireless doesn't make bad posture OK. Wireless or wired, use correct posture to avoid injury.

Ironically, people with repetitive keying injuries are not necessarily fast typists. Awkward postures and sustained positions-not speed-create computer-related injuries.

By adjusting your keyboard to encourage good posture, you eliminate one source of injury. By making slight changes to the angle and position of your keyboard over the course of the day, you change your position and eliminate another.

 

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IT: First Line of Defense Against Computer Injuries

Small changes can make a big difference in comfort

Last week, I visited a major law firm. One IT staff member had piled extra shoes under her workstation, tangling the cords so she couldn't pull her keyboard forward. Piles of cord spaghetti were everywhere.

Before long, I was sitting on the floor, untwisting cables.

When you pay attention to all aspects of your workspace-even the cables-you can work more comfortably. When cords can move freely, it's easy to keep your keyboard and mouse in the best positions.

IT staff members with lots of computer knowledge but little experience with muscles, tendons, joints, and bones can spread safe work habits throughout an organization. When IT staffers pay attention to ergonomics, they and their colleagues stay healthy. And I stay off the floor.

Here are some ways your IT department can help prevent injuries:

Location, location, location. Expect IT to help you find the best place for your machine. If your workspace has a window, your monitor should be perpendicular to the window. In many offices, the location of electrical outlets determines the location of the computer workspace. Choose the most appropriate spot to work, then, if necessary, request that cabling and electrical outlets be changed.

Positioning. Expect IT to help you sit correctly. If a technician drops a machine on your work surface, be sure to check that monitor, keyboard, and your body are centered on the same line. If your equipment is too heavy to move, IT should reposition it.

Cord control. Expect IT to make it easy for you to change positions throughout the day. When cords are tangled and twisted, you lose flexibility to adjust the position of your equipment. IT can help you untangle and control cords.

Equipment trade-ins. Expect IT to help you choose equipment that suits your size and work habits. Even though your keyboard makes you uncomfortable, it might be just fine for the person down the hall. IT can help you exchange equipment.

Cleaning. Expect IT to help you keep your equipment clean. IT can clean your equipment or show you how. For example, request screen wipes to clean your monitor.

For smaller businesses or at home, when you have to be your own IT department:

• Look at your room. Determine the ideal spot for your computer, regardless of furniture, cable, and outlets. Try to get your monitor 90 degrees to natural light.
• Look at your workstation. Make sure your monitor, keyboard and chair are centered on the same line.
• Look at your cables. Are they twisted? Can you take advantage of their full length? Remember, your keyboard and mouse should be as close to your body as possible.
• Look at yourself. Are you sitting in the chair, not on it? Sit all the way back in the seat and keep your shoulders back.
• Look at the dust! Buy a can of duster to blow all the dust and grit out of your keyboard. Clean your screen every day.

Learn more about keeping your home office safe and efficient at below.

Time to move?

Your computer is easy to move. When you take time to adjust your computer's location, you can work more comfortably and prevent injury and eye strain.

 

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Crack! Twinge! Ouch! Time to adjust your workspace

Simple strategies to relieve that pain in your neck

When I visit businesses to talk about workplace safety, people want to talk about their necks.

Computer workers tell me, "I've been to the doctor" or "I've had x-rays" or "I'm starting physical therapy next week."

There's a reason for all this pain. On my visits to offices in Boston and around New England, I see people working in postures that strain their necks and spines:

• Accountants perched on the edge of their desk chairs.
• Attorneys craning their necks to see a too-high monitor.
• IT professionals reaching over manuals to keyboard.
• Receptionists twisting their heads to see paper documents.

That's the bad news. The good news is that very small changes to the relationships among your body, your chair, your monitor, your mouse, and your keyboard can lead to a large improvement in how you feel.

So if you are in pain--or want to avoid future injuries--here are some ways you can adjust the way you work.

Sit back in your chair. Use a footstool (or put a fat book on the floor) so you don't slide forward.

Keep your keyboard close. Adjust the relationship between your keyboard and your body so you elbows fall at your sides and you're not reaching forward.

Center your monitor. Your monitor should be straight ahead, centered on your keyboard. And make sure you're not craning your neck up or down. Of computer workers I see with neck pain, 100% have the monitor positioned either at the wrong height or off to one side. See my website for an illustration of the correct position.

Use a document holder. If your work requires that you refer to paper documents, use a document holder that is in line with your monitor so your eyes--not your neck--do the work.

Once a month or so--for example, every time you receive my newsletter--check your office setup to make sure you're still working safely. Equipment gets moved, you get busy, the next thing you know, your neck hurts at the end of the day.

Notice that I haven't said a word about buying new equipment. Modest changes in your position and your relationship to your equipment often make all the difference.

Read more about preventing neck pain below.

 

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November 30, 2006

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November 2, 2006