Texting addicts more prone to painful 'text-necks'

Washington: If you love chatting on phone, you are likely to develop what doctors are calling the painful phenomenon as the "text neck."

According to the marketing agency Tecmark, people pick up their mobile about 1,500 times a week, leading to more and more people feeling the strain, CBS News reported.

Dr. Robert Markison, a clinical professor of surgery at the University of California San Francisco, said that people were looking down and bending too much towards their gadgets, which was the main cause of the pain.

Markison said even bending our heads at a slight angle could have major effects. On average, our heads weigh 10 to 12 pounds. At an angle of 15 degrees, gravity makes it feel like 27 pounds. At 60 degrees, where most of us bend our heads to our phones, it feels like 60 pounds hanging on your neck.

A study by Dr. Kenneth Hansraj, chief of spine surgery at New York Spine Surgery and Rehabilitation Medicine, had warned that "loss of the natural curve of the cervical spine leads to incrementally increased stresses about the cervical spine. These stresses may lead to early wear, tear, degeneration and possibly surgeries."

Markinson added that the problem is not just for the neck and the whole system from brain to fingertips was needed to be maintained, for along with chronic neck and back pain, bad posture has been linked to a host of other medical problems, including headaches and other neurological problems, depression, constipation, and even heart disease.