Office chairs Comfortable office chairs mean more time concentrating on the job in hand rather than the pain in your back. Our swivel chairs come with features like armrests, height-adjustable seats and tilt functions that your body will love. And the different styles mean they fit in wherever you want to work in comfort.A number of studies have shown that sitting at your desk all day is not good for your overall health, but there’s been little proof that sitting for long hours leads to back pain. Still, some studies do show that sitting puts pressure on the disks supporting your spine, which may make you prone to injury. “One of the negative effects of sitting is that it puts the spine in a flexed position (bent forward) and this may cause your back muscles to stop working efficiently, putting your back at risk of injury,” said Donald R. Murphy, clinical assistant professor at the Alpert Medical School of Brown University in Providence, R.I. Also, many people, at least anecdotally, complain that sitting makes their backs start to ache, and if you already suffer from back pain, sitting may make it worse.

But there are definitely steps you can take to protect your back-- and some bad habits that can make it worse.cheap wedding chair slipcoversErgonomics is the study of designing equipment and devices that fit the human body and its movements. folding camp chair repair partsIn other words, people have studied what shape and height your chair should be and what positions of your back, feet and arms are the most natural and cause the least strain on your body. egg chair swing cheapErgonomics can get excruciatingly detailed, but here are the key points:buy folding chairs nz 1. Make sure your lower back (lumbar spine) is curved naturally forward (as opposed to slumped outwards). buy baby potty chair for little ones

This is so important because it reduces the strain on your back. Many ergonomically-designed chairs have a “lumbar support” built into them that is designed to maintain the curve.  used office chair mumbaiIf yours doesn’t, you can buy a lumbar support pillow to stick behind your back.  wooden throne chairs for saleIf you can’t do that, it is best to sit forward in your chair so you can let your spine fall naturally into a forward curve.navy accent chair canada 2. Adjust your chair and desk heights. cheap comfy outdoor chairsYour desk height should allow your forearms to rest comfortably at a 90-degree angle. Your wrists should not be higher than your elbows.

The top of your computer screen should also be at or slightly below eye level. 3. Keep your feet flat on the floor and your back against the chair. Shoulders must be relaxed and be careful not to hunch them up.Get up and stretch every 30 to 60 minutes. Sitting for long periods puts pressure on discs and can weaken your muscles supporting your back. “Walking around for a few seconds and doing a few standing back bends (provided this does not cause pain) is enough to offset the negative effects of sitting,” Murphy said. Stand up and place your hands on your lower back. Gently push your hips forward and slightly arch your back. This takes the pressure of the discs. If you have some privacy, get down on the floor and do the yoga position called “the cobra,” in which you lie on your stomach and press up with your arms leaving your hips on the floor. Studies have shown that doing the cobra 15 times per day can lessen the likelihood of future back pain, Murphy added.

Take regular breaks and microbreaks. Just getting up out of your chair can help break the cycle of clenched muscles. “We recommend people take many microbreaks to relax their muscles, and reduce their stress,” says Erik Peper, professor at the Institute for Holistic Health Studies at San Francisco State University. Drop your hands to your lap for one second or less every few minutes or raise and drop your shoulders. You can make a rule to do this every time you send an email, click the mouse or do some other regular task, or install break reminders on the computer such as Stretchbreak.To help your body cope with sitting, do core exercises like Pilates to strengthen your core muscles. Core exercises can train your muscles to work more efficiently, countering the negative effects of sitting. Aside from doing back specific exercises, simply getting regular aerobic exercise will help ward off back pain. Laurie Tarkan is an award-winning health journalist whose work appears in the New York Times, among other national magazines and websites.

She has authored several health books, including "Perfect Hormone Balance for Fertility." Follow her on  Twitter  and  Facebook . Product Type: Desk Chair Overall: 21.5'' W x 23.5'' D Seat: 18'' D x 19.5'' WOffice Chair Back Support Best Ergonomic Chair Kneeling Chair Sciatica Back Pain Office Chairs Make It Workshop I Want Forwards Stokke ergonomic chair. Not only stylish with its optional back support, but perfect to avoid back pain and bad office postures.In A Developer's Second Most Important Asset, I described how buying a quality chair may be one of the smartest investments you can make as a software developer. I still believe this to be true, and I urge any programmers reading this to seriously consider the value of what you're sitting in while you're on the job. In our profession, seating matters: Choice of seating is as fundamental and constant as it gets in a programming career otherwise marked by relentless change. They are long term investments.

Why not take the same care and consideration in selecting a chair as you would with the other strategic directions that you'll carry with you for the rest of your career? Skimping yourself on a chair just doesn't make sense. Although I've been quite happy with my Herman Miller Aeron chair over the last 10 years, I've always been a little disenchanted with the way it became associated with dot-com excess: In the '90s, the Aeron became an emblem of the dot-com boom; it symbolized mobility, speed, efficiency, and 24/seven work weeks. The Aeron was a must-have for hot startups precisely because it looked the least like office furniture: It was more like a piece of machinery or unadorned engineering. The black Pellide webbing was durable, and hid whatever Jolt or Red Bull stains you might get on it. Held taut by an aluminum frame, the mesh allowed air to circulate and kept your body cool. What's more, the chair came in three sizes, like a personalized tool. Assorted knobs and levers allowed you to adjust the seat height, tilt tension, tilt range, forward tilt, arm height, arm width, arm angle, lumbar depth, and lumbar height.

The Aeron was high-tech but sexy – which was how the dot-commers saw themselves. But baby-faced CEOs weren't drawn to the Aeron only for the way it looked. The Aeron was a visual expression of the anti-corporate zeitgeist, a non-hierarchical philosophy about the workplace. An office full of Aerons implicitly rejected the Fortune 500, coat-and-tie, brick-and-mortar model in which the boss sinks back in an overpriced, oversized, leather dinosaur while his secretary perches on an Office Max toadstool taking notes. I recently had the opportunity to sit in a newer Herman Miller Mirra chair on a trip, and I was surprised how much more comfortable it felt than my classic Aeron. The Mirra chair was an excellent recliner, too. I've been disappointed by how poorly the Aeron reclines. I actually broke my Aeron's recline pin once and had to replace it myself. So I've retrained myself not to recline, which is awkward, as I'm a natural recliner. All this made me wonder if I should retire my Aeron and upgrade to something better.

I liked the Mirra, but the comments to my original chair post have a lot of other good seating suggestions, too. Here are pictures and links to the chairs that were most frequently mentioned as contenders, in addition to the Mirra and Aeron pictured above: There were also some lesser known recommendations, such as the Haworth Zody chair, Nightingale CXO chair, BodyBilt ergo chairs, Hag kneeling chair, NeutralPosture ergo, the Chadwick Chair from the original designer of the Aeron, and something called the swopper. Chair fit is, of course, a subjective thing. If you're investing $500+ in a chair, you'd understandably want to be sure it's "the one". The thing to do is find a local store that sells all these chairs and try them all out. Well, good luck with that. Don't even bother with your local big-box office supply chain. Your best bet seems to be back stores, as they tend to stock many of the more exotic chairs. Apparently they have a clientele of people who are willing to spend for comfort.

Reviews of individual chairs are relatively easy to find, but aren't particularly helpful in isolation. What we need is a multi-chair review roundup. The only notable roundup I know of is Slate's late 2005 Sit Happens: The Search for the Best Desk Chair. It's not as comprehensive as I would like, but it does have most of the main contenders. Notably, Slate's winner was the HumanScale Liberty. Some other helpful resources I've found, both in the comments to this post, and elsewhere: If this is all a bit too much furniture porn for your tastes, I understand. As for me, I'm headed off to my local friendly neighborhood back store to figure out which of these chairs will best replace my aging Aeron. By my calculations, the Aeron cost me about $7 per month over its ten year lifetime; I figure my continued health and comfort while programming are worth at least that much. Update: Since people have been asking, I ultimately decided the best fit and feel for me, personally, was the Herman Miller Mirra chair.