Herniated Disc is the disease of the future for office workers

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Spinal discs are a type of tissue that works like shock absorbers between two spinal vertebrae. Every time movement occurs, the spinal discs function to support the weight and impact between the bones, thus allowing the bones to move. However, upon growing older or after heavy use of the spine, such as by sitting for extended periods of time with a bad posture, playing sports or lifting heavy objects, the spinal discs will deteriorate and break or move out of place, thus placing pressure on the spinal nerves and potentially threatening walking or balance.

• Adolescents: Normally, spinal discs in patients belonging to this age group are still healthy, except in cases where they lift excessive weight or suffer an accident that causes severe impacts on the spinal discs, which can lead to breakage and herniation of the spinal discs.
• Older patients: Normally, our spinal discs begin to degenerate when we’re around 30 years and older, and this degeneration will continue with increasing age. Whenever, degeneration is followed by compression of the spinal nerves, pain, numbness and muscle weakness can occur.
• Other triggers are also involved such as working for long periods while sitting with a bad posture. This is particularly true for office workers who often sit for a long time in the same posture for many years consecutively. Even without severe impacts, their spinal discs can also deteriorate as a result.
• Smoking is another factor for the spinal discs to degenerate more rapidly, because cigarettes contain chemicals that affect the blood vessels. Heavy smoking over long periods can cause the spinal discs to degenerate faster than normal.

• If the patient’s symptoms are not very severe, the doctor will choose a non-surgical treatment approach such as by using medications, physical therapy, acupuncture or drug injection. However, if the patient’s pain symptoms do not improve after 1-2 months, the doctor will recommend surgery.

• If the patient experiences pain symptoms, muscle weakness, numbness and abnormal bowel regulation, doctors will recommend urgent surgery, because faster surgery results in better patient recovery.

• The most suitable sport for this condition is swimming. In addition to increasing back muscle mass, it has less impact from exercise, because water always supports the body weight when moving, thus preventing severe injuries from exercise.
• As for people who do not know how to swim, they have to choose exercise techniques that focus on building their back muscles such as weight training with the assistance of a trainer to provide correct exercise recommendations, or yoga or Pilates, which improve muscle elasticity as well as muscle strength.
• As for people who do office work and have to sit for a long time at a desk, we recommend finding spare time to stretch several times each day to loosen the muscles and spine to prevent excessive tightness.