How do I protect my body from years of hunching over patients as a hygienist?

You have mastered the work, and your body has kept the receipts. Years bent over patients settle into the neck, the shoulders, the back, and expertise does nothing to spare you that. This ache is not a complaint. It is the honest wage of a physical craft done well for a long time. The skill will not save your body; only care for the body will. That means treating your posture, your breaks, and your own maintenance as part of the job, not as luxuries you squeeze in after. Loupes, a better stool, stretches between patients, strengthening the muscles that hold you up, these are not vanity. They are how you keep doing the work you are good at. Start with one change this week, a real stretch between each patient, or finally adjusting your setup so you stop leaning. Your body carried you this far. Now it needs you to carry it a little, so the years ahead cost you less than the years behind.