Healthy Car Habits

September 2nd, 2020 by
Having healthy habits while in the car can lead to better posture, reduced back pain, and overall better comfort while on the road. We are teaming up with Wilsonville Toyota and Austin Nolan of West Chiropractic and Wellness to bring you a series of short videos about healthy car habits.
The first video goes over the importance of your vehicles headrest and some stretches you can do on long road trips. The headrest is often overlooked, but it is an extremely important part of your vehicle to prevent whiplash in the event of a crash or sudden harsh braking. With no headrest, your neck is free to bend all the way back, worsening any type of injuries that may occur. With a properly aligned headrest, you can essentially eliminate any potential neck injuries by allowing it to block your neck from bending backwards.
The video also covers an exercise you can do while on long road trips to help ease any stiffness. The exercise is called a “chin retraction”, in which you move your neck back and forth to work out any stiffness. Check out the video below for a tutorial, and be sure to stay tuned for the next ones!

 

The second video in the series goes over proper driving posture and lower back positioning for longer road trips. The lower back often gets irritated because of the positioning, creating a lordotic curve, which is essentially a c-shaped curve creating more space between your seat and lower back. The best thing to do is to reduce the space in that area by using your vehicles lumbar support, if it has it, or by using a lumbar roll or rolled up towel to put in that empty space. Another thing mentioned is to not slouch while driving, and by keeping a proper knee angle while your hands are on the wheel. Be sure to check out the video below for a tutorial!

 

 

The third video in our series goes over some rest stop stretches that you can do while taking a break on those long road trips.  These stretches are recommended to do 3-5 reps each side while focusing more time on high tension areas. The first stretch is called a standing ankle roll. This one is fairly simple, you just lift your foot off the ground and rotate your ankle clockwise and counterclockwise; repeat for each foot. The next stretch is called a kneeling lunge. You can use your car for support and throw one leg back and bring the heel up and back down, again repeating this for each side. Another stretch Dr. Nolan goes over in this video is the assisted hip hinge. Using the car for support, put both hands on it and stand almost arms length away, and hinge forward from the hips. Another stretch is called the assisted lumbar extension. For this one, put both hands on your lower back and use it as a fulcrum point to roll back and create a stretch to relieve those long hours sitting. The final stretch is called a neck roll. This one you just tilt your head back and roll it both clockwise and counterclockwise, to loosen up the neck and upper back. Feel free to watch the video below for a more in depth and visual tutorial on how to do these stretches yourself!

 

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