The Benefits of Adding Variety to your Work Routine

Constant repetitive activities are the bane of the average office worker's existence. Many repetitive tasks are often associated with the use of particular devices, like keyboards and mice, but some also have to do with being stationary for long periods of time, whether sitting in a chair or standing in front of a desk. Regardless of the repetitive activity, serious injuries may result over the long term if preventative measures are not taken before one begins to manifest the symptoms of repetitive stresses. Often called 'Repetitive Stress Injuries' or 'RSI', these injuries can significantly reduce one's ability to perform even casual tasks, aside from being quite painful or discomforting. In conjunction with good ergonomic equipment, there are a few common sense strategies for avoiding the hazards connected with constant repetitive tasks. These include:

1. Alternating between left and right hands when mousing. A frequent complaint of computer users is that, if they use a traditional mouse intensively, either their left or right hands will begin to experience fatigue or develop pains, sometimes radiating all the way up to the shoulder, neck, or back. The specific causes and symptons will vary, of course, but the general cause in these cases appears to be an over-worked hand and arm. In order to avoid or minimize such pains, use an ambidextrous mouse that you can alternate between different hands. For example, try using a touchpad on the right-hand side of your keyboard for part of the day, then switch positions to the left-hand side for the remainder of the day, so that the hands and arms on either side can adequately rest throughout the work period. You may find that this will reduce the severity of the pains in either hand and arm enough to allow you to function normally again. Just make sure that you do not simply switch hands to the non-dominant hand, which can cause the same problem in the other hand if there is no alternating between hands over regular intervals of time.

2. Alternating between hands and feet when mousing. If the pains in your hand are connected to the fingers, especially if your fingers are used mostly to click the buttons on your mouse, consider getting a footswitch to offload the stresses from your finger to your foot, so that you can now 'click' with your foot and move the cursor on your monitor screen with the mouse on your desk. This division of labour will help minimize any build up of stresses on the fingers that lead to painful clicking without overwhelming the muscles in the feet. With a good quality footswitch, you can program the foot pedals to do any kind of clicking action a mouse would normally do, such as a Left Click, Right Click, or Middle Click. Because footswitches are also ambidextrous, you may even alternate between different feet throughout the day to further reduce any build up of stresses. Variety of positioning and muscle activity is the key idea here.

3. Alternating between sitting and standing. Another long term complaint from computer users has to do with sitting or standing for long periods of time with little variation in positioning. For those fortunate enough to obtain one, the sit/stand workstation will remedy this particular complaint by allowing the user to sit at his or her desk for part of the day while standing at the same desk for another part of the day. Special ergonomic equipment is usually required for the set up, which transforms the standard workstation (desk and chair) into a more ergonomic one (the sit/stand workstation with height adjustable keyboard tray and arm with or without a height adjustable monitor arm). Another option are chairs that provide but do not restrict motion and allow one to vary one's position and posture as they perform different tasks at their workstation, such as the Swing Seat Pro.

4. Taking frequent breaks throughout the day. This last tip may seem the most obvious, but it should obviously work well in almost any situation, and so should be incorporated into every work routine. Not only does your body benefit from frequent resting periods, but so does your mind. Specific kinds of breaks include taking eye breaks from staring at your monitor screen for long periods of time. It helps to do this if you have access to a window that you can look through. Another kind of break involves stretching the muscles in your hands, arms, legs, and back. Get up and walk around the office for a few minutes, or combine this with a much deserved coffee break (the added benefit of coffee breaks is that they often necessitate frequent bathroom breaks). You will then go back to work a little more refreshed and focused.