for your health
BY JANE LANGILLE
DR. KENNETH HANSRAJ, a Costco member and chief of spine surgery at New York
Spine Surgery & Rehabilitation Medicine, in
Poughkeepsie, New York, wondered why a
30-year-old male patient still suffered from
neck pain long after Hansraj had surgically
repaired a herniated disk in his back. The
man was unable to return to work in spite of
months of physical therapy. At a follow-up
exam, the source of his pain was crystal clear:
He admitted to spending four hours a day
playing Angry Birds on his iPad and showed
his doctor how he looked down at the screen.
Like Hansraj, Dr. Dean Fishman, a Costco
member and chiropractor in Plantation,
Florida, has noticed an alarming trend of more
patients showing signs of early disk degeneration in the cervical spine (the upper part of the
spine that supports the neck). He coined the
term “text neck” and founded his practice, the
Text Neck Institute (
text-neck.com).
The trend is worrying, since 92 percent of
American adults have a mobile phone, up substantially from 65 percent in 2004. Almost
three-quarters of teens ages
13 to 17 have a smartphone or
have access to one. More than
half go online several times
per day, and a quarter of them
say they go online “almost
constantly,” according to the
Pew Research Center.
Dr. Karen Jacobs, an
occupational therapist,
ergonomist and clinical professor at Boston University,
says, “With all of these new
technologies, we are adopting
more awkward postures and
‘turtling in’ as screens get
smaller and smaller.”
Practice perfect posture.
“Stand and sit with a neutral
spine, with ears over shoulders and your shoulder
blades retracted, rather than
hunching shoulders forward,” says spine surgeon
Dr. Kenneth Hansraj. Check
your posture by looking at
photos of yourself.
Vary postures, set limits
and take breaks. As soon
as you feel uncomfortable,
change your posture.
Consider using a sit-stand
desk. A free iOS and Android
app called Stretch Break for
Kids reminds kids to take
breaks and demonstrates
stretches.
Bring devices up to eye
level. Sit on the floor with
your back to a wall, knees
bent, holding the device on
your knees. Place your tablet
on a table and use a case
that allows you to prop it at
a higher angle so you don’t
have to tilt your neck. Dr.
Dean Fishman’s Text Neck
Indicator app for Android
phones, available in free and
paid versions at Google Play,
notifies you when the screen
angle is too low.
Make technology work for
you. Use the talk-to-text
function. Search using Siri on
iOS or Voice Search on
Android devices.
Strengthen your neck
muscles. Try neck and
shoulder muscle strengthening exercises, such as the
Upward Dog yoga pose. In
all cases, move to where you
feel a gentle stretch. If you
have questions, consult first
with your health care practitioner.—JL
Text neck
“When you stand with good posture,
there is a normal curvature in your cervical
spine. From a side view, it looks like the letter
With good, neutral
spine posture—ears in line
with shoulders and shoulder
blades pulled back—the
head weighs about 10 to 12
pounds. A recent study by
Hansraj, published in the
journal Surgical Technology
International, found that
when the head is flexed for-
ward at an angle of 60
Tips to help prevent text neck
degrees to look at a mobile device, the effective weight of the head increases significantly,
to 60 pounds, putting extra stress on the cervical spine. “For a teenager with their head
down two to four hours daily, that’s up to
300,000 pounds of stress over 5,000 hours
during high school,” says Hansraj.
Don’t stick your neck out for tech
In a case study of patients ages 13 to 27 at
his practice, Fishman instructed half of the
participants to use their device at eye level
every time. The other half used their devices
as usual. Both groups received physical therapy, exercises and chiropractic treatment.
After one month of care, patients in both
groups reported decreased pain and showed
improved results for range of motion and
X-ray findings, but those who used their
devices at eye level experienced a significantly
greater correction in cervical spine curvature.
Hansraj’s patient improved too: He
stopped playing Angry Birds with his head
down and worked with a physical therapist to
improve his posture. “His neck pain is much
better, and he is back to work in a labor-inten-sive job at a car wash,” says Hansraj. That’s
great news, since we are not about to give up
texting, searching, posting on social media,
accessing emails or watching videos on our
phones anytime soon. C
Jane Langille ( janelangille.com) is a Toronto-area health and medical writer.
troubles
Text neck
Keep your
head in the
right place
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These illustrations
show how the
weight of one’s head
increases as one
looks down at a
mobile device,
putting increased
pressure on the
cervical spine.
©
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