Do you have pain in your heel or under the sole of your foot?

Do you have pain in your heel or under the sole of your foot?

Does it feel like there’s a stone under your heel every time your foot hits the ground?

Does getting out of bed in the morning fill you with dread?

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You may have plantar fasciopathy or plantar fasciitis as it is more commonly known. Plantar fasciitis is the most common cause of heel pain and is thought to occur in about 10% of the population, more commonly in women and in both the right and left feet concurrently in about 1/3 of cases.

The cause or onset of this condition doesn’t have to be traumatic in nature, you don’t need to be a sportsperson or active person who suffers an identifiable injury at pain onset. Office workers or people with a sedentary lifestyle can suffer from it as well. To explain this, we must understand how this condition comes about.

The plantar fascia is a strong, thick fibrous connective tissue under your foot. It ranges from your big toe and goes to the heel. However, this structure doesn’t technically end there as your Achilles tendon also merges with it into one continuous structure. The plantar fascia’s job is to absorb the load and impact from the ground as you weight bear, but also redirect the force of impact and release upon the push off phase during walking/ jogging/running/ jumping.

Symptoms such as pain or tension typically arise when the fascia has been overloaded or overused. This can potentially lead to tissue disrepair leading to plantar fascia thickening and a loss of elasticity as the fascia is severely overloaded, and in some cases may even lead to some degree of tearing. Our very own Sandy Clarke recently suffered a significant tear in his plantar fascia measuring 1mmx3mmx9mm!

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The reason why this condition is difficult to treat and manage is because of the complex and varied causes which must be addressed. If we are dealing with a overloading the tissue we need to start with unloading it. Overloading can occur obviously when we upgrade our activities too quickly, for example when we decide we are going to start exercising and do too much too soon. Another way to overload the tissues is less obvious, for example you have have flat feet and may not be getting enough support from our footwear, or you may have ut on a little weight over time. In Sandy’ case, he had a few weeks off exercise due to Covid, then tried to play tennis and run around playing soccer with the kids at the park.

Treating someone with one or more of these causes can be challenging. Examples of treatment are strengthening, stretching, taping, orthotics, gait retraining, advice on loading and self-management, use of walking aides for a short period of time and manual therapy. In some more difficult persistent cases Shockwave Therapy may be an option. At Logan Physio, we assess and treat based on what you tell us and what we find on testing the relevant structures. We are then able to come up with the best solution for you in order for you to get the result you are looking for.

Given Sandy Clarke’s recent tear of his plantar fascia, on his birthday this year, we are pleased to be able to take you on his journey of recovery. Given the degree of tissue damage we would expect this to take about 6-8 weeks to get him through the repair phase and then a further few months of progressive strengthening and loading (exercise) to get him back to do the things he enjoys like jogging and surfing. If you are interested in following Sandy’s journey watch out for all the updates on our facebook page https://www.facebook.com/search/top?q=logan%20physio

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