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Take a Load Off of Your Kid's Back Take a Load Off of Your Kid's Back
By: Dr. Andrew Weil,MD
Middle school students are carrying backpacks that are too heavy for them, some weighty enough to cause shoulder pain or even low back pain if they are unevenly positioned. A study at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine found that the pressure put on shoulders by a backpack equal to 20 percent of a child’s body weight was enough to reduce normal blood flow to skin and muscle in the area. They noted that a typical loaded backpack equals 22 percent of a child’s body weight. For the study, the researchers tested backpacks on ten 13-year-olds, five boys and five girls. The more weight the backpack held, the more pain the children reported. To prevent injury, the researchers recommended that backpacks should be positioned high on the back, the straps should be wide and worn over both shoulders, and the contents of backpacks should be minimized to lower the weight. The Consumer Product Safety Commission has estimated that nearly 7,500 school children come to emergency rooms each year for backpack-related injuries. The study was published in the December 2005 issue of the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine. Source: www. nlm.nih.gov/ medlineplus/news
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