Throughout middle school I remember wheeled backpack becoming popular. Claims that heavy backpacks were giving children bad backs prompted many parents to take this route for their kids. Having suffered from low back pain since my early teenage years I thought it would be interesting to investigate the effects of a backpack on adolescence back.

Unsurprisingly hundreds upon thousands of different articles showed links between backpacks and lower back pain in adolescents. According to an academic journal entitled Backpacks Back Pain Sagittal Curves And Trunk Alignment In Adolescences, the negative effects on the back from backpack for obvious. In a study involving over 1200 students, 46% suffered backpack related backpack pain. Other interesting findings included that backpack carriers who carry on one shoulder are on average 2.9 to 5 times more likely to suffer from dorsal pain and low back pain compared to those who carry backpacks symmetrically. The unequal distribution of the weight causes a shift in the shoulder level and is carried down the spine to create an upper trunk shift. These asymmetric carriers also or four times more likely you have extreme back pain.

Another article by akronchildrens.org suggests that back packs cause poor posture and children. I from experience understand that poor posture can result in a in an array of issues including muscular and spinal pain. Poor posture has limited my ability to golf frequently.

Easily convinced that back pains resulted from packs I decided to see what doctors recommended to contradict this issue. Dr. Brian Lane suggested the parents begin to examine the contents of your child pack and to suggest certain items that can stay at home or at school. Another helpful tip from the New York Times was to find a well-designed backpack that set on the children’s back properly and of course I suggested the rolling backpack. I know I wouldn’t have used one. But maybe someone else will. Akron children’s.org also said distribute the weight evenly in the backpack to put padded straps and make sure that your child’s backpack is no more than 10 to 15% of their body weight.

This topic may have been simple I have found out exactly what the long-term consequences can be of wearing backpacks. I think heading in the direction of laptops with online books will help decrease backpack wait and ultimately save children from chronic back pain.

http://ovidsp.tx.ovid.com/sp-3.16.0b/

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/23/heavy-backpacks-can-spell-chronic-back-pain-for-children/

https://www.akronchildrens.org/cms/sharing_blog/c7795fbcf89d5409/

http://www.everydayhealth.com/hs/back-to-school/backpack-causing-chronic-back-pain/