Is Your Backpack Causing You Pain?

By Julie Castaneda

Many Texas Tech students carry heavy backpacks across campus, full of books, binders and laptops, only to discover that one is never too young to get back pain.

Kevin McAlpin, a chiropractor in Lubbock who also works with the Texas Tech track team, said the weight of your backpack can wreak havoc on your neck, shoulder and back muscles.

“If it’s too heavy, its can cause you some problems with your shoulder right here, as well as back problems because you’re having to bend over to carry it,” McAlpin said. “You change the biomechanics of the way you walk to offset the weight distribution from the backpack.”

Texas Tech graduate Tasha Witmer said that as a student, she had to carry many books, binders, notebooks and other material to class.

“Some books were fairly large, such as my accounting ones, so they were pretty heavy,” she said. “It hurt my back, but I needed to carry it all day, so I can make it to each class on time. I still remember the strain I had put on my back from carrying everything with me to this day, and still hurts from time to time.”

McAlpin offered the following tips: wear your backpack on both shoulders and carry only what you need.

And what if your back already hurts?

“Rest, ice, compression elevation,” he said. “You need to ice it for 20 minutes with a T-shirt between your skin and the ice and that will decrease a lot of the inflammation, a lot of soreness will get rid of it. “

About JOUR 4350

JOUR 4350 is the multiplatform news delivery class, which is the capstone class for journalism majors within the College of Media & Communication.

Comments

  1. Hello Castaneda,
    My backpack already hurt me and thanks for sharing this awesome solution. Will follow your solution to get rid off from back pain.