How Back Supports Work

All back supports work by improving the shape of the spine when sitting - by correcting a slouched or slumped posture, stress in the back is reduced.

Back pain has many different causes, but the very large majority involve stress, either in the back muscles, the discs (also called the intra-spinous disks), the tendons, ligaments or the facet joints where the vertebrae touch during bending, or any combination of these. Sometimes genetic factors, disease, or accident injury make people more susceptible to back problems, but then management of stress in the back becomes even more important. There's no need to resign yourself to a pain-filled life just because you have a "bad back" - nearly everyone can make a big improvement by management, a key part of which includes always sitting with a supported lumbar spine.

Most back problems are a result of stress outstripping recovery over a long period of time. Within limits some stress 'damage' is normal and not in itself a problem, it's the same stress-recovery cycle that gives fitness in athletes, but incomplete recovery leads to a progressive accumulation of damage. Many areas of the back don't have pain sensors, so you may not feel anything until a critical point is reached and a disc herniates or back muscles lock up in spasm.

By making your sitting time less stressful for your back, correct back support turns sitting time into recovery time. It's a crucial difference.