By Orion Christy
Recently, Daytona State College’s Occupational Therapy Assistant program conducted a two-day test to see how many students were “out of sync” with the national recommended guidelines for backpack weight, being 15 percent of body weight.
This is believed to be a very serious problem as estimates by the American OTA put more than 78 million, or over 55 percent, of American students over the recommended limit. OTA and DSC professor Shirish Lasa was heading the backpack weigh-in with about a dozen of his students on day one, who were testing handgrip strength as well as pinch strength, along with the backpack weight of 80 students.
Professor Lasa has been conducting this test annually for four years now, but says his predecessors had been hosting it since 2006.
“Today has been great, the best turnout since I started,” said Lasa.
DSC students’ test results primarily came in under weight, but this is believed to be because of it being a non-math/science heavy day and the weigh-in taking place away from those parts of campus.
Second year OTA student Jessica Shaw, went on to say, “I’m pleasantly surprised by both the turnout and number of students within normal limits.”
Overall, it appears that students here are not at an overwhelming risk of dehabilitating back problems.