Mel,
I really enjoyed your comments on the "right" form of seating and "correct"
posture. Although I am primarily a "developmental " physiotherapist working with
infants and youn children,I spend 3-4 hours a week giving excercise classes to
women of child bearing age and beyond. My excercises combine many movements that
young children execute naturally as they move up against gravity.I believe it is
these combinations and the flexibility and strength to perform a variety of
movements that keeps back pain (and hip and shoulder pain for that matter ) at
bay.
Just like we accept that regular teeth brushing is an essential part of our lives
the human population needs to work at maintaining a healthy back and body
through regular excercise

[log in to unmask] wrote:

> The following discussion from another group on the issue of back problems may
> also be of interest here.
>
> Mel Siff
> ----------------------------------------------
>
> SQUATTING & BACK PROBLEMS
>
> Todd Gastaldo wrote:
>
> <<As much as I'd like to agree with Mr Asselbergs, his ability to comfortably
> squat in adulthood may not be a consequence of his childhood squatting while
> playing.
>
> Stated another way, as with Mr. Asselbergs' daughter, ALL human children
> (unless they are disabled) start flat-footed squatting all by themselves; BUT
> even when they are forced to sit in chairs for prolonged periods, SOME retain
> the flexibility necessary for comfortable squatting. Mr. Asselbergs may be
> one of these fortunate few.
>
> That said, I hasten to add that MOST Westerners wind up in adulthood having
> been robbed of this fundamental human rest (and play) posture. As elderly
> Western chairdwellers bill Medicare for "ejection" chairs to help them stand
> up from their chairs, most elderly persons on the planet are able to stand
> from a full squat without assistance... Medicaid pays billions per MONTH to
> warehouse elderly Westerners - in part because of immobility that could be
> easily prevented... Those who read me know that I call this The Great Squat
> Robbery.
>
> See:
>
> Pt 1: Chiro prevention/CBP not onboard...
> http://www.deja.com/=dnc/getdoc.xp?AN=450898123
>
> Pt 2: THE GREAT SQUAT ROBBERY
> http://www.deja.com/=dnc/getdoc.xp?AN=450898128>>
>
> ---------------------------------‘
>
> Mel Siff:
>
> ***I read these two most interesting articles and can appreciate some merits
> in all of the arguments, but in much of the deductive reasoning involved ,
> there appears to be an allness approach - solution A is right; solution B is
> wrong. Maybe there are merits in certain aspects of all the different
> viewpoints.
>
> INTRODUCTORY REMARKS
>
> These articles suggest an hypothesis that all chair sitting is harmful and
> the avoidance of the full squatting position sets up a chain of events which
> is responsible for a great deal of back dysfunction.
>
> Just as we cannot attribute all heart disease to altered cholesterol levels
> or any single cause, we cannot fairly attribute all back pain and dysfunction
> to one single or major cause. While I agree that prolonged periods of poorly
> postured chair sitting (even in so-called ergonomically safe executive
> chairs) and minimal use of full range squatting (or any other movements) may
> be relevant factors in the evolution of certain back problems, there are also
> other factors which may be equally important.
>
> LOGICAL DEDUCTIONS?
>
> It is well known that sitting in one unchanging position can cause or
> exacerbate certain back and other problems, as is evident from the pressure
> sores and back pain experienced by immobilised patients and spinal patients.
> However, we are not justified in blaming these problems on the sitting
> posture or the use of chairs in the 'normal' population.
>
> What we can deduce from such situations is that back discomfort and
> subsequent problems may well have a lot to do with the prolonged assumption
> of a single, unvarying posture, which, inter alia, compromises blood flow,
> imposes high levels of stress on the same structures for long periods and
> sometimes imposes unmitigated stress on various nerves.
>
> If one studies speeded-up time lapse photographs of people sitting, standing
> and sleeping, it is amusing and enlightening to observe that the unparalysed
> body is in a regular state of carrying out weird and wonderful 'dances' and
> contortions which ostensibly take place to minimise the problems alluded to
> above. It would appear that the nervous system contains a program which
> automatically tries to minimise the risks associated with prolonged
> maintenance of identical postures.
>
> IDEAL POSTURE?
>
> In other words, there is no such thing as an ideal posture. Although there
> is a mechanical model of the body which suggests a most thermodynamically
> efficient posture which minimises energy expenditure and distributes loads so
> as to minimise stress on endangered regions, there are ongoing deviations
> from ideal positions or states of theoretical homeostasis which optimise
> efficiency and safety.
>
> The body 'hunts around' positions of stasis (in a type of 'chaos', a field
> which recently has attracted a great deal of attention among physicists,
> engineers and physiologists), but never is in a state of perfect balance,
> because (according to the laws of thermodynamics), such states of perfect
> equilibrium or rhythm contain minimal information and do nothing to provide
> useful feedback and control. Some studies even show that tendencies to lose
> such deviations and attain greater rhythmicity (as in control of the cardiac
> rhythm) may even be percursors of impending failure.
>
> Thus, if one is to prescribe the best way of sitting, then we would say that
> there is no single best way - the best way is to move regularly and avoid
> maintenance of the same posture for prolonged periods. It is somewhat
> simplistic to claim that back and knee problems are rare in aboriginal or
> Eastern cultures just because their full squatting seating, cross-legged
> sitting or kneeling positions prevent back or knee problems. If one spends
> time in those cultures, you will notice that, even though seats are nowhere
> in evidence, the people do not sit in exactly the same posture all the time -
> they often vary their positions and are much more physically active than
> their Western counterparts, who certainly appear to have become "homo sedens"
> (sitting human).
>
> ERGONOMIC SCIENCE?
>
> Maybe we also need to comment on the fact that many primitive populations do
> not sleep on cushy posture hugging beds, but on reed mats, hammocks or on
> blankets laid on the ground. Surely something like 8 hours a day of back
> positioning during sleep certainly needs to be taken into consideration in
> analysing the aetiology of back problems Possibly we need to take a good,
> hard look at the fundamental tenets of modern ergonomics which so far appears
> to have had no noticeable impact on reducing the incidence of back problems
> in the West.
>
> It is actually a bit of a joke or swindle that some scientists proclaim that
> an 'ergonomically correct' chair solves back problems. If they notice how
> rarely a person sits in the exact same ergonomically ‘correct’ position on
> one of these costly chairs, they would be a great deal more cautious in
> penning this hypothesis. No matter what chair is used, a person will always
> be shifting. It is the constant injunctions of parents, teachers and
> military drill sergeants to "sit still", "stand still", "sit straight" and so
> forth which often instill beliefs that it is wrong to fidget sometimes.
> Fidgetting or postural shifting isnot always a sign of lack of control, but
> it may be a natural process intended to ensure physical well-being.
>
> Even then, it is not the mere act of sitting which is to blame; it is the
> manner in which it is done. First of all, ergonomists have proliferated one
> major error in seat design - they have perpetuated the use of a back rest, so
> that the automatic tendency after a few minutes is for the average person to
> lean back and allow the lumbar spine to flop into that very undesirable state
> of loaded flexion.
>
> SITTING OR MORE?
>
> What is common to all the different Eastern and primitive methods of sitting,
> whether it be in a lotus pose, Buddhist kneeling or full squatting, is that a
> person cannot lean lazily against something. So, when the Westerner fatigues
> during upright sitting, he simply leans back and slides further and further
> down into a state of increasing lumbar flexion, whereas his 'less civilised'
> colleagues change the positions of several other limbs.
>
> So, it seems as if it is the manner of sitting and the almost universal use
> of chair backs on Western seats have a lot more to do with back problems than
> the mere act of chair sitting.
>
> Let us take this issue a bit further. What effect does the chair height have
> on back position? Can we fairly compare the effects of sitting on low chairs
> with those of bar stools, even though the degree of spinal flexion tends to
> be less on very, backless high chairs? What if we go to the other extreme of
> using another Eastern and primitive design of very low chairs (yes, they
> often also DO use chairs - I lived in Africa and among Eastern populations
> for most of my life!) which allow the user to sit in an a very low position
> with very flexed knees? Should we condemn this use of all types of chair?
>
> PROBLEMS & INCREASED STRESS?
>
> Another more intriguing issue is the fact that lumbar stress in the seated
> position has been shown by Nachemson to be considerably greater than
> equivalent activities in the standing position, yet many folk complain that
> long periods of standing exacerbate back pain far more than the similar
> periods of sitting. If back pain or dysfunction is associated with greater
> levels of vertebral stress, then why does this happen? Similarly hospital
> patients lying for prolonged periods in bed often complain of severe back
> pain, even though Nachemson’s research shows that disc pressures are least of
> all in lying poses. Obviously we are going to suggest that it is not only
> disc stress, condition or thickness which may be implicated in the genesis of
> back dysfunction and pain.
>
> Finally, many of my Third World cousins used to complain about low back pain
> if they squatted for long periods in very low positions which allowed for the
> "tail to tuck under" the body – in other words, when forced nutation allowed
> the pelvis to tilt posteriorly for prolonged periods and stressing ligaments
> and connective tissue (and we know that these do contain proprioceptors and
> nociceptors). So, even when the presumably safer position of full squatting
> is used, back pain is quite commonly reported.
>
> In short, we cannot logically conclude that many back problems are alone due
> to modern seating or lack of squatting. It is apparent that the technique
> or manner of executing any posture or exercise may be more to blame than the
> activity concerned, where ‘manner’ includes issues such as technical skill,
> patterns of movement, duration of loading, and the overtraining (overload and
> overuse) syndrome.
>
> Dr Mel C Siff
> Denver, USA
> [log in to unmask]




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