#Working from bed can cause permanent damage, experts warn

Working from home? Get out of bed.

If you start your day at the “office” by taking a quick shower, then getting a cup of coffee, cracking open your laptop — and getting back under the covers, watch out.

Experts say you may be setting yourself up for permanent physical and emotional damage, even if the negative effects of working from bed aren’t apparent at first.

Slumping on a soft surface like a bed can strain the neck, back, and hips and may cause pain to flare up in the months and years to come, the BBC reported. Headaches and insomnia may also result from too much time on a mattress.

“None of it is optimal,” Susan Hallbeck, director of health-care-system engineering at the Mayo Clinic, one of the largest medical research institutions in the US, told the BBC. “You’re really not supported in a way that’s conducive to work.”

Better to shed the bed and switch to working from some sort of table with a supportive chair, experts say.

According to a November 2020 study, 72% of 1,000 Americans said they worked remotely from their bed during the pandemic — double the number since the start of the crisis. One in 10 said they spent “most or all of their workweek” – 24 to 40 hours or more – in bed.