Ergonomic and Biomechanics Assessment
What is an ergonomic and biomechanics assessment?
An ergonomic assessment involves examining your posture in your work environment. In Toronto, office related work is a source of various injuries from neck and back to shoulders and hips. You may take pictures of yourself at your work station and bring these pictures into the clinic to discuss with your physiotherapist. If your injury is due to sport, your physiotherapist will assess the biomechanics in your technique. A faulty movement pattern can cause extra stress to your body leading to a sport injury.
How does my ergonomics affect my injury?
Poor posture is often times the source of many injuries. To explain this let's use the example of how using your phone poorly can create chronic neck pain. The human head weights about 10 pounds. When your neck is straight the weight of the head is absorbed by the bones in the neck, it’s natural spinal curvature, and the muscles around the neck are lightly activated.
As the head moves forward the weight of your head increases. This is due to the concept of torque. The is similar to you holding a back pack very close to your body versus holding it with outstretched arms. This increased weight of your head forces the muscles around your neck to work extra hard leading to fatigue, tension, and pain at the end of the work day. An ergonomic assessment will optimize your work station at the office helping you sit with better posture. By identifying and correcting your posture we can eliminate the root cause of the injury.
How does biomechanics affect my injury?
Activities that include repetitive movements can lead to injuries over time if there is a faulty movement pattern. These faulty movement patterns can be due to muscle imbalances or incorrect technique. A biomechanics analysis will correct your movement which will place less load on your body and increase the efficiency of the technique. For example in runners, a common muscle imbalance that develops is weakness in the gluteus medius and tension along the gluteus maximus and IT band which can lead to knee or lower back injuries. A biomechanics analysis will improve your performance, reduce fatigue, and keep you from being sideline during your season.
For an Ergonomics and Biomechanics Assessment, book an appointment at Rebuild Physiotherapy in Toronto today!