Carpal tunnel syndrome is the most expensive upper-musculoskeletal disorder in America. The cost is even greater when you factor in the loss of work resulting from it. Your posture is everything when it comes to preventing this serious health risk.
With more entrepreneurs and computer-based jobs, laptops are replacing traditional PCs. Working wherever you want is certainly an upgrade from sitting in a cubicle. You do lose out on the (sometimes) ergonomic features of a modern office.
Laptops make it difficult to sit and work for prolonged periods of time at a desk. That is if you don't own an adjustable laptop stand. If you've never considered buying one, then this is the guide for you.
What is the "Proper" Way?
You hear a lot about how much it matters to be sitting in an ergonomic position for your health. What does that position look like, though?
First, your spine should be straight and upright. Your elbows should rest at a 90-degree position with the keyboard. Your feet need to sit flat on the ground and your monitor should be slightly above eye level.
If you're seeing a theme here, you'll notice that all these positions require as little muscle movement as possible. Even the slightest misalignment will cause pain and strain on multiple muscle groups. Over time, these stressors evolve into full-fledged injuries.
Introducing an Adjustable Laptop Stand
Now that you know what the proper sitting and typing position looks like, try to recreate it with a laptop. It's not really possible, as you'll see once you have it on your desk and adjust your chair. You'll either sit too high above the laptop screen or your knees and forearms will suffer.
If you do this long enough, your wrists, elbows, and knee joints will hate you. You have two options: hook your laptop up to an external monitor or buy an adjustable laptop desk stand. Hooking up an external monitor isn't always an option for many.
Your laptop needs to have the proper output port and your desk needs the depth to accommodate both screens. No, you can't close the laptop lid and work on the monitor. The cheapest and easiest solution is to get the laptop stand and an ergonomic keyboardand mouse.
Seeing Results
Investing in an adjustable laptop stand opens up new opportunities for those who work-from-home. You'll not only feel better while working long hours at the desk, but you can also work in your bed with some laptop stands. In fact, laying down in your bed and typing is a realistic alternative to sitting.
Speaking of seeing results, when you sit in the recommended typing posture, your eyes tire slower. With your eyes level to your monitor, you'll experience less eyestrain and blurry vision. This is what is referred to as Computer Vision Syndrome in the medical community.
Stiffness of the neck and eyestrain will bring on more frequent headaches and migraines.
When Your Laptop isn't Very Lap-friendly
Although laptops are getting lighter and slimmer, they don't really hold up that great over long hours. That extra five pounds on your lap starts to feel like 10 after 3-4 hours. The edges begin to dig into your wrists, too.
Laptops get hot after prolonged use, too. Very few laptops will stay cool on a lap or tabletop if you're doing more than word processing. That's because most laptops these days use passive cooling.
What that means is they either have no fans pushing air around inside or a small fan to reduce noise. This is great for 90% of your average laptop sessions. This is bad if you rely on your laptop as your main computer and work with video/editing.
An adjustable laptop desk stand remedies this problem with modern, lightweight laptops. You'll get plenty of airflow under the bottom vents and avoid performance hits from high temps.
Flexibility and Options
Another thing that laptops often lack is a wide viewing angle. This isn't a big deal for most users, as they'll never see this shortcoming if they are alone. Meanwhile, if you do share your screen a lot, it will become a nuisance.
With a swiveling laptop stand, you can easily move your screen all angles to make up for any glare or faded colors. This is ideal for those with small desks, where it's awkward trying to rotate a laptop around. You'll either need a bigger desk or have ample room cleared around the computer.
That's the beauty of having a stand to elevate your laptop. You can reduce the footprint of the laptop while opening up opportunities for storing supplies. Some stands even come with their own storage solutions for holding books, pens, paperclips, and etc.
You can take your "office" wherever you go, thanks to the flexibility of your laptop stand. Setup your space while on vacation or at any cafe where ergonomics is an afterthought.
Healthier Working, Better Living
Don't ever let your work life become a place where you sacrifice comfort. As soon as you start doing that, you'll start noticing chronic health problems. Those physical ailments start getting worse and before you know it you're in surgery.
An adjustable laptop stand is a game-changer for work-at-home entrepreneurs. You know that you'll need to pull long hours to become successful, so don't do it with a less-than-ideal setup. The laptop stands aren't expensive, so you can afford to pair it with other ergonomic pieces.
Check out our guide on ergonomic office furniture. This will help you find the most comfortable chairs, desks, and other accessories to make your life easier. Un-cage your work environment and your mind will be free to create.